On free evolution of self gravitating, spherically symmetric waves

Abstract

We perform a numerical free evolution of a selfgravitating, spherically symmetric scalar field satisfying the wave equation. The evolution equations can be written in a very simple form and are symmetric hyperbolic in Eddington-Finkelstein coordinates. The simplicity of the system allow to display and deal with the typical gauge instability present in these coordinates. The numerical evolution is performed with a standard method of lines fourth order in space and time. The time algorithm is Runge-Kutta while the space discrete derivative is symmetric (non-dissipative). The constraints are preserved under evolution (within numerical errors) and we are able to reproduce several known results.