Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Comment
  • Published:

Computational challenges in numerical relativity in the gravitational-wave era

Nature Computational Science volume 1, pages 450–452 (2021)Cite this article

Subjects

Gravitational-wave discoveries have ignited a new era of astronomy. Numerical relativity plays a crucial role in modeling gravitational-wave sources for current and next-generation observatories, but it doesn’t come without computational challenges.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on Springer Link
  • Instant access to full article PDF
Buy now

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Fig. 1: A snapshot of a numerical-relativity calculation of colliding black holes.

N. Fischer, H. Pfeiffer, A. Buonanno (Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics), Simulating eXtreme Spacetimes (SXS) Collaboration10

References

  1. Abbott, B. P. et al. Phys. Rev. Lett. 116, 061102 (2016).

    Article  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  2. Abbott, B. P. et al. Astrophys. J. Lett. 848, L12 (2017).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Abbott, R. et al. Phys. Rev. X 11, 021053 (2021).

    Google Scholar 

  4. Punturo, M. et al. Class. Quant. Grav. 27, 194002 (2010).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Reitze, D. et al. Am. Astron. Soc. 51, 035 (2019).

    Google Scholar 

  6. Amaro-Seoane, P. et al. Preprint at https://arxiv.org/abs/1702.00786 (2017).

  7. Baumgarte, T. W. & Shapiro, S. L. Numerical Relativity: Starting from Scratch (Cambridge Univ. Press, 2021).

  8. Pretorius, F. Phys. Rev. Lett. 95, 121101 (2005).

    Article  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  9. Duez, M. D. & Zlochower, Y. Rept. Prog. Phys. 82, 016902 (2019).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Fischer, N. L., Pfeiffer, H. P., Ossokine, S. & Buonanno, A. Zenodo https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4980985 (2020).

  11. Ossokine, S. et al. Phys. Rev. D 102, 044055 (2020).

    Article  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  12. Boyle, M. et al. Class. Quant. Grav. 36, 195006 (2019).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  13. Pürrer, M. & Haster, C.-J. Phys. Rev. Res. 2, 023151 (2020).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  14. Gamba, R., Breschi, M., Bernuzzi, S., Agathos, M. & Nagar, A. Phys. Rev. D 103, 124015 (2021).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Tichy, W., Adhikari, A. & Ji, L. Bull. Am. Phys. Soc. 65, D15.00004 (2020).

    Google Scholar 

  16. Fernando, M., Neilsen, D., Lim, H., Hirschmann, E. & Sundar, H. SIAM J. Sci. Comput. 41, C97–C138 (2018).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  17. Daszuta, B. et al. Preprint at https://arxiv.org/abs/2101.08289 (2021).

  18. Bugner, M., Dietrich, T., Bernuzzi, S., Weyhausen, A. & Brügmann, B. Phys. Rev. D 94, 084004 (2016).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  19. Deppe, N. et al. Zenodo https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4913286 (2021).

Download references

Acknowledgements

I am pleased to thank N. Fischer, S. Ossokine, H. Pfeiffer, M. Scheel and S. Teukolsky for helpful discussions and suggestions. This comment was supported in part by National Science Foundation awards PHY-1654359, PHY-1836734 and AST-1559694, by the Dan Black Family Trust, and by Nicholas and Lee Begovich.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Nicholas and Lee Begovich Center for Gravitational-Wave Physics and Astronomy, California State University, Fullerton, Fullerton, CA, USA

    Geoffrey Lovelace

Authors
  1. Geoffrey Lovelace
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Geoffrey Lovelace.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The author declares no competing interests.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Lovelace, G. Computational challenges in numerical relativity in the gravitational-wave era. Nat Comput Sci 1, 450–452 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s43588-021-00102-2

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s43588-021-00102-2

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing AI and Robotics

Sign up for the Nature Briefing: AI and Robotics newsletter — what matters in AI and robotics research, free to your inbox weekly.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing: AI and Robotics