The characteristics of black hole binaries after binary-binary encounters.

Goal:

There is an interesting new article which claims that black hole binaries in the cores of star clusters gain orbital eccentricity due to the interaction with a third star. This third star is picked up in an encounter between two binaries. If after the encounter in orbital inclination exceeds some specified limit, the eccentricity of the inner binary will grow. It is important to know how often black holes end up in such binaries to determine the number of candidate gravitational wave sources in star clusters.

Tasks:

perform binary-binary scattering experiments with existing software. Possibly these calculations have to be performed on a parallel machine, in which case the software has to be paralleled. The data must be analyzed, this includes: -comparison with existing results -determination of interaction cross section for the specified 'target' system: those with high inclination of the outer orbit.