Gravitational radiation from mergers of black hole neutron star binaries

Angular momentum loss via the emission of gravitational waves must eventually drive compact binaries containing black holes and/or neutron stars to coalesce. The resulting events are primary candidate sources for detectors such as VIRGO and LIGO. We present calculations of gravitational radiation waveforms and luminosities for the coalescence of a black hole-neutron star binary, performed in the quadrupole approximation using a Newtonian smooth particle hydrodynamics code. We discuss the dependence of the waveforms and the total emitted luminosity as well as the final configuration of the system on the initial mass ratio and the degree of tidal locking.