General relativistic moving-mesh hydrodynamics simulations with AREPO and applications to neutron star mergers

We implement general relativistic hydrodynamics in the moving-mesh code AREPO. We also couple a solver for the Einstein field equations employing the conformal flatness approximation. The implementation is validated by evolving isolated static neutron stars using a fixed metric or a dynamical spacetime. In both tests the frequencies of the radial oscillation mode match those of independent calculations. We run the first moving-mesh simulation of a neutron star merger. The simulation includes a scheme to adaptively refine or derefine cells and thereby adjusting the local resolution dynamically. The general dynamics are in agreement with independent smoothed particle hydrodynamics and static-mesh simulations of neutron star mergers. Coarsely comparing, we find that dynamical features like the post-merger double-core structure or the quasi-radial oscillation mode persist on longer time scales, possibly reflecting a low numerical diffusivity of our method. Similarly, the post-merger gravitational wave emission shows the same features as observed in simulations with other codes. In particular, the main frequency of the post-merger phase is found to be in good agreement with independent results for the same binary system, while, in comparison, the amplitude of the post-merger gravitational wave signal falls off slower, i.e. the post-merger oscillations are less damped. The successful implementation of general relativistic hydrodynamics in the moving-mesh AREPO code, including a dynamical spacetime evolution, provides a fundamentally new tool to simulate general relativistic problems in astrophysics.