Black Hole - Neutron Star Binary Mergers: The Imprint of Tidal Deformations and Debris

Understand

The increase in the sensitivity of gravitational wave interferometers will bring additional detections of binary black hole and double neutron star mergers.

• It will also very likely add many merger events of black hole - neutron star binaries.
• Distinguishing mixed binaries from binary black holes mergers for high mass ratios could be challenging because in this situation the neutron star coalesces with the black hole without experiencing significant disruption.
• To investigate the transition of mixed binary mergers into those behaving more like binary black hole coalescences, we present results from merger simulations for different mass ratios.