GW190425

On January 6, 2020, the LIGO Scientific Collaboration and the Virgo Collaboration announced the discovery of a second binary neutron star merger, labeled GW190425. This is the first confirmed gravitational-wave detection based on data from a single observatory. No electromagnetic counterpart was found. This system is notable for having a total mass that exceeds that of known galactic neutron star binaries.

Publications & Documents

Selected Images & Video



Simulation of the binary neutron star coalescence GW190425 This movie shows a numerical simulation representing the binary neutron star coalescence and merger which resulted in the detected gravitational-wave event GW190425. The two neutron stars shown here have properties consistent with the detection made by the Advanced LIGO/Virgo detectors. Still images can be downloaded from this link.

[Credit: Numerical Relativity Simulation: T. Dietrich (Nikhef), Wolfgang Tichy (Florida Atlantic University) and the CoRe-collaboration Scientific Visualization: T. Dietrich (Nikhef), S. Ossokine, and A. Buonanno (Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics)]



Additional numerical simulation of GW190425 This video shows the numerical relativity simulation of a binary neutron star system compatible with the source of the GW190425 signal, detected by the LIGO-Virgo global network of gravitational-wave detectors on April 25th, 2019. It is made of two parts, both showing the last orbits of the neutron stars, then their collision, followed by the prompt collapse of the remnant into a black hole. The first part focuses on the dynamics of the neutron star matter in the strong field central region; the highest mass-density (blue) are above nuclear densities, the white surfaces appearing later approximate the black hole horizon. The second part, a zoom out of the same simulation, shows the propagation of the emitted gravitational waves on the orbital plane and far from the source.

[Credit: CoRe collaboration www.computational-relativity.org / Jena FSU]



Artist's rendition of a binary neutron star merger.

[Image credit: National Science Foundation/LIGO/Sonoma State University/A. Simonnet.]