Strong Gravity

The group's research on strong gravity involves finding analytical and numerical solutions of Einstein's theory of general relativity, and many of its extensions, either in vacuum or coupled to various types of matter. For our latest developments/activities in this area, please see the listing at the end of this article.

The prime examples of (relativistic) strong gravitational systems are Black Holes. They are truly unifying objects of all physics. The understanding of their formation and dynamics requires the laws of all four fundamental forces, and their physics is relevant not only for astrophysics and cosmology but for a variety of topics within high energy physics.

See here a movie made by the COST action `Black holes in a violent universe', in which our group participates, for a visual overview of different types of black holes.


Latest Strong Gravity Publications

The imitation game reloaded: effective shadows of dynamically robust spinning Proca stars, I. Sengo, P. V. P. Cunha, C. A. R. Herdeiro, E. Radu; arXiv:2402.14919 [gr-qc].

Publication type
Regular Articles
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Aspects of regular and singular electromagnetic-generalized-quasitopological-gravities black holes in (2+1) dimensions, J. Oliveira, R. D. B. Fontana, A. B. Pavan; arXiv:2401.10025 [gr-qc].

Publication type
Regular Articles
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Twisting shadows: light rings, lensing and shadows of black holes in swirling universes,
Z. S. Moreira, C. A. R. Herdeiro, L. C. B. Crispino; arXiv:2401.05658 [gr-qc].

Publication type
Regular Articles
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 LRs on stationary axisymmetric spacetimes: blind to the topology and able to coexist, P. V. P. Cunha, C. A. R. Herdeiro, J. P. A. Novo; arXiv:2401.05658 [gr-qc].

Publication type
Regular Articles
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The pseudospectra of black holes in AdS, B. Cownden, C. Pantelidou, M. Zilhão; arXiv:2312.08352 [gr-qc].

Publication type
Regular Articles
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Latest Strong Gravity News & Events

Beyond Einstein: An assessment of higher curvature gravity,

Speaker
Sudipta Sarkar (Indian Institute of Technology, Gandhinagar, India)
Event date
Venue
Hybrid: Room Sousa Pinto and Zoom
Ends on
Event type

The Einstein-Hilbert action is the simplest possible generally covariant action for gravity. While Einstein's equations conform with all observational data, theoretical considerations suggest the possibility to add higher curvature correction terms to Einstein's theory.

Numerical evolutions with the Kadath library: Application to the Schwarzschild black hole and Teukolsky gravitational waves

Gr@v Seminars - Banner
Speaker
Jordan Nicoules (CIDMA, University of Aveiro)
Event date
Venue
On-site: Room TBD
Event type

Numerical Relativity is a key tool for the study of strong-field gravity. I will present a new evolution code, based on the Kadath library. It relies on multidomain spectral methods for the space discretization, and explicit time integration schemes.

Numerical evolution of well-posed field theories with anisotropic scaling

Gr@v Seminars - Banner
Speaker
Marcelo Rubio (SISSA, Trieste)
Event date
Venue
On-site: Room TBD
Event type
Dynamical equations exhibiting an anisotropic scaling between space 
and time admit a dispersive nature, as they contain higher-order spatial derivatives, 
but remain second order in time.

Discussion of the paper "Cauchy evolution of asymptotically global AdS spacetimes with no symmetries", by Hans Bantilan, Pau Figueras, and Lorenzo Rossi

Speaker
Jordan Nicoules (U. Aveiro)
Event date
Venue
Hybrid: Room Sousa Pinto and Zoom
Ends on
Event type

Cauchy evolution of asymptotically global AdS spacetimes with no symmetries

Hans Bantilan, Pau Figueras, and Lorenzo Rossi

arXiv:2011.12970v2 [hep-th]

From Hubble to Bubble - gravitational waves from phase transitions after inflation

Gr@v Seminars - Banner
Speaker
Andreas Mantziris (University of Porto)
Event date
Venue
Hybrid: Sala Sousa Pinto and Zoom
Event type

The prospect of a stochastic gravitational wave (GW) background from the primordial universe offers a promising new window for cosmology and fundamental physics.