A particular type of binary in which there is a very large difference in the masses of the two objects. Generally, this will involve a super-massive Black Hole with a mass millions of times that of our Sun, and a Neutron Star or Black Hole with a mass roughly the same as our Sun.
Come, you lost Atoms, to your Centre draw,
And be the Eternal Mirror that you saw:
Rays that have wander'd into Darkness wide,
Return and back into your Sun subside.
From Farid al-Din Attar's
twelfth-century masterpiece
The Conference of the Birds
The SXS project is a collaborative research effort involving multiple institutions. Our goal is the simulation of black holes and other extreme spacetimes to gain a better understanding of Relativity, and the physics of exotic objects in the distant cosmos.
The SXS project is supported by Canada Research Chairs, CFI, CIfAR, Compute Canada, Max Planck Society, NASA, NSERC, the NSF, Ontario MEDI, the Sherman Fairchild Foundation, and XSEDE.