We investigate the use of hybrid equations of state in binary neutron-star simulations in full general relativity, where thermal effects are included in an approximate way through the adiabatic index $Gamma_{rm{th}}$. We employ a newly developed finite-temperature equation of state derived in the Brueckner-Hartree-Fock approach and carry out comparisons with the corresponding hybr
We present results from three-dimensional general relativistic simulations of binary neutron star coalescences and mergers using public codes. We considered equal mass models where the baryon mass of the two Neutron Stars (NS) is $1.4M_{odot}$, described by four different equations of state (EOS) for the cold nuclear matter (APR4, SLy, H4, and MS1; all parametrized as piecewise polytropes). We started the simulations from four different initial interbinary distances ($40, 44.3, 50$, and $60$ km), including up to the last 16 orbits before merger. That allows to show the effects on the gravitational wave phase evolution, radiated energy and angular momentum due to: the use of different EOSs, the orbital eccentricity present in the initial data and the initial separation (in the simulation) between the two stars. Our results show that eccentricity has a major role in the discrepancy between numerical and analytical waveforms until the very last few orbits, where tidal effects and missing high-order post-Newtonian coefficients also play a significant role. We test different methods for extrapolating the gravitational wave signal extracted at finite radii to null infinity. We show that an effective procedure for integrating the Newman-Penrose $psi_4$ signal to obtain the gravitational wave strain $h$ is to apply a simple high-pass digital filter to $h$ after a time domain integration, where only the two physical motivated integration constants are introduced. That should be preferred to the more common procedures of introducing additional integration constants, integrating in the frequency domain or filtering $psi_4$ before integration.
We perform binary neutron star merger simulations using a newly derived set of finite-temperature equations of state in the Brueckner-Hartree-Fock approach. We point out the important and opposite roles of finite temperature and rotation for stellar stability and systematically investigate the gravitational-wave properties, matter distribution, and ejecta properties in the postmerger phase for the different cases. The validity of several universal relations is also examined and the most suitable EOSs are identified.
Recently exploratory studies were performed on the possibility of constraining the neutron star equation of state (EOS) using signals from coalescing binary neutron stars, or neutron star-black hole systems, as they will be seen in upcoming advanced gravitational wave detectors such as Advanced LIGO and Advanced Virgo. In particular, it was estimated to what extent the combined information from multiple detections would enable one to distinguish between different equations of state through hypothesis ranking or parameter estimation. Under the assumption of zero neutron star spins both in signals and in template waveforms and considering tidal effects to 1 post-Newtonian (1PN) order, it was found that O(20) sources would suffice to distinguish between a hard, moderate, and soft equation of state. Here we revisit these results, this time including neutron star tidal effects to the highest order currently known, termination of gravitational waveforms at the contact frequency, neutron star spins, and the resulting quadrupole-monopole interaction. We also take the masses of neutron stars in simulated sources to be distributed according to a relatively strongly peaked Gaussian, as hinted at by observations, but without assuming that the data analyst will necessarily have accurate knowledge of this distribution for use as a mass prior. We find that especially the effect of the latter is dramatic, necessitating many more detections to distinguish between different EOS and causing systematic biases in parameter estimation, on top of biases due to imperfect understanding of the signal model pointed out in earlier work. This would get mitigated if reliable prior information about the mass distribution could be folded into the analyses.
We present the first set of numerical relativity simulations of binary neutron mergers that include spin precession effects and are evolved with multiple resolutions. Our simulations employ consistent initial data in general relativity with different spin configurations and dimensionless spin magnitudes $sim 0.1$. They start at a gravitational-wave frequency of $sim392$~Hz and cover more than $1$ precession period and about 15 orbits up to merger. We discuss the spin precession dynamics by analyzing coordinate trajectories, quasi-local spin measurements, and energetics, by comparing spin aligned, antialigned, and irrotational configurations. Gravitational waveforms from different spin configuration are compared by calculating the mismatch between pairs of waveforms in the late inspiral. We find that precession effects are not distinguishable from nonprecessing configurations with aligned spins for approximately face-on binaries, while the latter are distinguishable from a nonspinning configurations. Spin precession effects are instead clearly visible for approximately edge-on binaries. For the parameters considered here, precession does not significantly affect the characteristic postmerger gravitational-wave frequencies nor the mass ejection. Our results pave the way for the modeling of spin precession effects in the gravitational waveform from binary neutron star events.