22–25 Jul 2019
ECT* - Villa Tambosi
Europe/Rome timezone
Abstracts submission open. Posters do not require abstract submission.

Application of the black hole-fluid analogy: identification of a vortex flow through its characteristic waves

23 Jul 2019, 14:30
30m
Meeting room (ECT* - Villa Tambosi)

Meeting room

ECT* - Villa Tambosi

Strada delle Tabarelle, 286 38123 - Villazzano (TN) Italy

Speaker

Prof. Silke Weinfurtner (School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Nottingham)

Description

Black holes are like bells; once perturbed they will relax through the emission of characteristic waves. The frequency spectrum of these waves is independent of the initial perturbation and, hence, can be thought of as a `fingerprint' of the black hole. Since the 1970s scientists have considered the possibility of using these characteristic modes of oscillation to identify astrophysical black holes. With the recent detection of gravitational waves, this idea has started to turn into reality. Inspired by the black hole-fluid analogy, we demonstrate the universality of the black-hole relaxation process through the observation of characteristic modes emitted by a hydrodynamical vortex flow. The characteristic frequency spectrum is measured and agrees with theoretical predictions obtained using techniques developed for astrophysical black holes. Our findings allow for the first identification of a hydrodynamical vortex flow through its characteristic waves. The flow velocities inferred from the observed spectrum agree with a direct flow measurement. Our approach establishes a non-invasive method, applicable to vortex flows in fluids and superfluids alike, to identify the wave-current interactions and hence the effective field theories describing such systems.

Presentation materials

There are no materials yet.