Self-force corrections to the periapsis advance around a spinning black hole

Abstract

The linear in mass ratio correction to the periapsis advance of equatorial orbits around a spinning black hole is calculated for the first time and to very high precision, providing a key benchmark for different approaches modelling spinning binaries. The high precision of the calculation is leveraged to discriminate between two recent incompatible derivations of the 4PN equations of motion. Finally, the limit of the periapsis advance near the innermost stable orbit (ISCO) allows determination of the ISCO shift, validating previous calculations using the first law of binary mechanics. Calculation of the ISCO shift is further extended into the near extremal regime (with spins up to $1-a=10^{-20}$), revealing new unexpected phenomenology. In particular, we find that the shift of the ISCO does not have a well defined extremal limit, but instead continues to oscillate.

Figures (3)

• Figure 1: Comparison of our (exact) numerical calculation of the linear in mass ratio correction to the periapsis advance, $\rho_{\mathrm{GSF}}$, to previous NR $\rho_{\mathrm{NR}}$ and PN $\rho_{\mathrm{PN}}$ estimates at $a=-0.5$ provided in Tiec:2013twa. The inset shows the differences $\Delta_{\mathrm{NR}}=\lvert\rho_{\mathrm{NR}}-\rho_{\mathrm{GSF}}\rvert$ and $\Delta_{\mathrm{PN}}=\lvert\rho_{\mathrm{PN}}-\rho_{\mathrm{GSF}}\rvert$ on a semi-Log-scale. The shade region indicates the error on the NR estimate.
• Figure 2: Log-Log plot of the residual differences $\Delta_{\mathrm{PN}n}:= \lvert\rho_{\mathrm{GSF}}-\rho_{\mathrm{PN}n}\rvert$ between our calculation of $\rho_{\mathrm{GSF}}$ at $a=0$ and successive PN approximants $\rho_{\mathrm{PN}n}$ provided in Bini:2016qtx. The shaded area indicates the estimated numerical error on the self-force result.
• Figure 3: Comparison of two methods for calculating the ISCO shift from either GSF or redshift data. The x-axis has had a non-linear scaling applied to better display the new phenomenology in the $a>0.9$ region. The inset shows a close-up of the near extremal limit plotting $\delta{C}=C_\Omega-C_1$ vs. $\delta{a}=1-a$, revealing persistent order $10^{-5}$ oscillations.