Faithful Effective-One-Body waveforms of small-mass-ratio coalescing black-hole binaries

Abstract

We address the problem of constructing high-accuracy, faithful analytic waveforms describing the gravitational wave signal emitted by inspiralling and coalescing binary black holes. We work within the Effective-One-Body (EOB) framework and propose a methodology for improving the current (waveform)implementations of this framework based on understanding, element by element, the physics behind each feature of the waveform, and on systematically comparing various EOB-based waveforms with ``exact'' waveforms obtained by numerical relativity approaches. The present paper focuses on small-mass-ratio non-spinning binary systems, which can be conveniently studied by Regge-Wheeler-Zerilli-type methods. Our results include: (i) a resummed, 3PN-accurate description of the inspiral waveform, (ii) a better description of radiation reaction during the plunge, (iii) a refined analytic expression for the plunge waveform, (iv) an improved treatment of the matching between the plunge and ring-down waveforms. This improved implementation of the EOB approach allows us to construct complete analytic waveforms which exhibit a remarkable agreement with the ``exact'' ones in modulus, frequency and phase. In particular, the analytic and numerical waveforms stay in phase, during the whole process, within $\pm 1.1 %$ of a cycle. We expect that the extension of our methodology to the comparable-mass case will be able to generate comparably accurate analytic waveforms of direct use for the ground-based network of interferometric detectors of gravitational waves.