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Testing general relativity with amplitudes of subdominant gravitational-wave modes

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arxiv 2511.11886 v2 pith:MSI6FDDI submitted 2025-11-14 gr-qc astro-ph.COhep-th

Testing general relativity with amplitudes of subdominant gravitational-wave modes

Ish Gupta , Purnima Narayan , Lionel London , Shubhanshu Tiwari , Bangalore Sathyaprakash This is my paper
classification gr-qc astro-ph.COhep-th
keywords testamplitudeappliedgeneralrelativitydeviationsgravitational-wavemode
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We present an improved subdominant-mode amplitude (SMA) test of general relativity (GR), which probes amplitude-level deviations in the higher-order modes of gravitational-wave (GW) signals from binary black hole mergers while keeping the dominant quadrupole mode fixed. Using a comprehensive parameter-estimation campaign, we benchmark the test against Gaussian noise fluctuations, waveform modeling systematics, and physical effects such as spin precession and orbital eccentricity. When applied to numerical-relativity simulations, the SMA test performs reliably for aligned-spin and mildly precessing systems but exhibits measurable biases for strongly precessing or eccentric binaries. Although designed to detect amplitude deviations, the test also responds coherently to phase perturbations, yielding apparent GR violations when applied to phase-modified waveforms. Applied to recent GW detections, we report the strongest constraint on the hexadecapolar $(4,4)$ mode amplitude deviation, $\delta A_{44} = -0.30^{+1.16}_{-3.45}$, consistent with GR. With these results, this work establishes the SMA test as a robust and broadly sensitive null test of general relativity and demonstrates a systematic approach for assessing the robustness of GW tests of GR.

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