Time-domain metric reconstruction for hyperbolic scattering

Understand

Self-force methods can be applied in calculations of the scatter angle in two-body hyperbolic encounters, working order by order in the mass ratio (assumed small) but with no recourse to a weak-field approximation.

• This, in turn, can inform ongoing efforts to construct an accurate model of the general-relativistic binary dynamics via an effective-one-body description and other semi-analytical approaches.
• Existing self-force methods are to a large extent specialised to bound, inspiral orbits.
• Here we develop a technique for (numerical) self-force calculations that can efficiently tackle scatter orbits.