Excitation of g-modes of solar-type stars by an orbiting companion (original) (raw)

Gravitational waves from perturbed stars

Bulletin of the Astronomical Society of India, 2011

Non radial oscillations of neutron stars are associated with the emission of gravitational waves. The characteristic frequencies of these oscillations can be computed using the theory of stellar perturbations, and they are shown to carry detailed information on the internal structure of the emitting source. Moreover, they appear to be encoded in various radiative processes, as for instance in the tail of the giant flares of Soft Gamma Repeaters. Thus, their determination is central to the theory of stellar perturbation. A viable approach to the problem consists in formulating this theory as a problem of resonant scattering of gravitational waves incident on the potential barrier generated by the spacetime curvature. This approach discloses some unexpected correspondences between the theory of stellar perturbations and the theory of quantum mechanics, and allows us to predict new relativistic effects.

Gravitational Radiation from Triple Star Systems

International Journal of Modern Physics A, 1999

We have studied the main features of the gravitational radiation generated by an astrophysical system constituted of three compact objects attracting one another (only via gravitational interaction) in such a manner that stable orbits do exist. We have limited our analysis to systems that can be treated with perturbative methods. We show the profile of the gravitational waves emitted by such systems. These results can be useful within the framework of the new gravitational astronomy which will be made feasible by means of the new generation of gravitational detectors such as LISA in a no longer far future.

Gravitational waves from stellar encounters

Astroparticle Physics, 2008

The emission of gravitational waves from a system of massive objects interacting on elliptical, hyperbolic and parabolic orbits is studied in the quadrupole approximation. Analytical expressions are then derived for the gravitational wave luminosity, the total energy output and gravitational radiation amplitude. A crude estimate of the expected number of events towards peculiar targets (i.e. globular clusters) is also given. In particular, the rate of events per year is obtained for the dense stellar cluster at the Galactic Center.

Gravitomagnetic resonant excitation of Rossby modes in coalescing neutron star binaries

Physical Review D, 2007

In coalescing neutron star binaries, r-modes in one of the stars can be resonantly excited by the gravitomagnetic tidal field of its companion. This post-Newtonian gravitomagnetic driving of these modes dominates over the Newtonian tidal driving previously computed by Ho and Lai. To leading order in the tidal expansion parameter R/r (where R is the radius of the neutron star and r is the orbital separation), only the l = 2, |m| = 1 and |m| = 2 r-modes are excited. The tidal work done on the star through this driving has an effect on the evolution of the inspiral and on the phasing of the emitted gravitational wave signal. For a neutron star of mass M , radius R, spin frequency fspin, modeled as a Γ = 2 polytrope, with a companion also of mass M , the gravitational wave phase shift for the m = 2 mode is ∼ 0.1 radians (R/10 km) 4 (M/1.4M⊙) −10/3 (fspin/100 Hz) 2/3 for optimal spin orientation. For canonical neutron star parameters this phase shift will likely not be detectable by gravitational wave detectors such as LIGO, but if the neutron star radius is larger it may be detectable if the signal-to-noise ratio is moderately large. The energy transfer is large enough to drive the mode into the nonlinear regime if fspin 100 Hz. For neutron star-black hole binaries, the effect is smaller; the phase shift scales as companion mass to the-4/3 power for large companion masses. The net energy transfer from the orbit into the star is negative corresponding to a slowing down of the inspiral. This occurs because the interaction reduces the spin of the star, and occurs only for modes which satisfy the Chandrasekhar-Friedman-Schutz instability criterion. A large portion of the paper is devoted to developing a general formalism to treat mode driving in rotating stars to post-Newtonian order, which may be useful for other applications. We also correct some conceptual errors in the literature on the use of energy conservation to deduce the effect of the mode driving on the gravitational wave signal.

Gravitational waves from pulsating stars: Evolving the perturbation equations for a relativistic star

Physical Review D, 1998

We consider the perturbations of a relativistic star as an initial-value problem. Having discussed the formulation of the problem (the perturbation equations and the appropriate boundary conditions at the centre and the surface of the star) in detail we evolve the equations numerically from several different sets of initial data. In all the considered cases we find that the resulting gravitational waves carry the signature of several of the star's pulsation modes. Typically, the fluid f -mode, the first two p-modes and the slowest damped gravitational w-mode are present in the signal. This indicates that the pulsation modes may be an interesting source for detectable gravitational waves from colliding neutron stars or supernovae. We also survey the literature and find several indications of mode presence in numerical simulations of rotating core collapse and coalescing neutron stars. If such mode-signals can be detected by future gravitational-wave antennae one can hope to infer detailed information about neutron stars. Since a perturbation evolution should adequately describe the late time behaviour of a dynamically excited neutron star, the present work can also be used as a bench-mark test for future fully nonlinear simulations.

Gravitational waves production from stellar encounters around massive black holes

2009

The emission of gravitational waves from a system of massive objects interacting on elliptical, hyperbolic and parabolic orbits is studied in the quadrupole approximation. Analytical expressions are then derived for the gravitational wave luminosity, the total energy output and gravitational radiation amplitude. A crude estimate of the expected number of events towards peculiar targets (i.e. globular clusters) is also given. In particular, the rate of events per year is obtained for the dense stellar cluster at the Galactic Center.

Gravitational waves from nonlinear couplings of radial and polar nonradial modes in relativistic stars

Physical Review D, 2007

The post-bounce oscillations of newly-born relativistic stars are expected to lead to gravitationalwave emission through the excitation of nonradial oscillation modes. At the same time, the star is oscillating in its radial modes, with a central density variation that can reach several percent. Nonlinear couplings between radial oscillations and polar nonradial modes lead to the appearance of combination frequencies (sums and differences of the linear mode frequencies). We study such combination frequencies using a gauge-invariant perturbative formalism, which includes bilinear coupling terms between different oscillation modes. For typical values of the energy stored in each mode we find that gravitational waves emitted at combination frequencies could become detectable in galactic core-collapse supernovae with advanced interferometric or wide-band resonant detectors.

Computational Approach to Gravitational Waves Forms in Stellar Systems as Complex Structures through Keplerian Parameters

2009

In this paper we investigate the gravitational waves emission by stellar dynamical structures as complex systems in the quadrupole approximation considering bounded and unbounded orbits. Precisely, after deriving analytical expressions for the gravitational wave luminosity, the total energy output and gravitational radiation amplitude, we present a computational approach to evaluate the gravitational wave-forms from elliptical, circular, parabolic and hyperbolic orbits as a function of Keplerian parameters.

Gravity modes in rapidly rotating stars

Astronomy and Astrophysics, 2010

Context. CoRoT and Kepler missions are now providing high-quality asteroseismic data for a large number of stars. Among intermediate-mass and massive stars, fast rotators are common objects. Taking the rotation effects into account is needed to correctly understand, identify, and interpret the observed oscillation frequencies of these stars. A classical approach is to consider the rotation as a perturbation. Aims. In this paper, we focus on gravity modes, such as those occurring in γ Doradus, slowly pulsating B (SPB), or Be stars. We aim to define the suitability of perturbative methods. Methods. With the two-dimensional oscillation program (TOP), we performed complete computations of gravity modes-including the Coriolis force, the centrifugal distortion, and compressible effects-in 2D distorted polytropic models of stars. We started with the modes = 1, n = 1−14, and = 2−3, n = 1−5, 16−20 of a nonrotating star, and followed these modes by increasing the rotation rate up to 70% of the break-up rotation rate. We then derived perturbative coefficients and determined the domains of validity of the perturbative methods. Results. Second-order perturbative methods are suited to computing low-order, low-degree mode frequencies up to rotation speeds ∼100 km s −1 for typical γ Dor stars or ∼150 km s −1 for B stars. The domains of validity can be extended by a few tens of km s −1 thanks to the third-order terms. For higher order modes, the domains of validity are noticeably reduced. Moreover, perturbative methods are inefficient for modes with frequencies lower than the Coriolis frequency 2Ω. We interpret this failure as a consequence of a modification in the shape of the resonant cavity that is not taken into account in the perturbative approach.