Comparison of Polarized Radiative Transfer Codes Used by the EHT Collaboration
Journal article, 2023
Interpretation of resolved polarized images of black holes by the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) requires predictions of the polarized emission observable by an Earth-based instrument for a particular model of the black hole accretion system. Such predictions are generated by general relativistic radiative transfer (GRRT) codes, which integrate the equations of polarized radiative transfer in curved spacetime. A selection of ray-tracing GRRT codes used within the EHT Collaboration is evaluated for accuracy and consistency in producing a selection of test images, demonstrating that the various methods and implementations of radiative transfer calculations are highly consistent. When imaging an analytic accretion model, we find that all codes produce images similar within a pixel-wise normalized mean squared error (NMSE) of 0.012 in the worst case. When imaging a snapshot from a cell-based magnetohydrodynamic simulation, we find all test images to be similar within NMSEs of 0.02, 0.04, 0.04, and 0.12 in Stokes I, Q, U, and V, respectively. We additionally find the values of several image metrics relevant to published EHT results to be in agreement to much better precision than measurement uncertainties.
Author
Ben Prather
Los Alamos National Laboratory
Jason Dexter
JILA
M. Mościbrodzka
Radboud University
Hung-Yi Pu
National Taiwan Normal University
Academia Sinica
Thomas Bronzwaer
Radboud University
Jordy Davelaar
Flatiron Institute
Columbia University
Radboud University
Ziri Younsi
Goethe University Frankfurt
University College London (UCL)
Charles F. Gammie
University of Illinois
R. Gold
University of Southern Denmark
George N. Wong
Princeton University
Institute for Advanced Studies
Kazunori Akiyama
National Astronomical Observatory of Japan
Harvard University
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
Antxon Alberdi
Spanish National Research Council (CSIC)
Walter Alef
Max Planck Society
Juan-Carlos Algaba
University of Malaya
Richard Anantua
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
University of Texas
Harvard University
K. Asada
Academia Sinica
R. Azulay
Max Planck Society
Universitat de Valencia
U. Bach
Max Planck Society
A. K. Baczko
Max Planck Society
David Ball
University of Arizona
Mislav Baloković
Yale University
John Barrett
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
M. Bauböck
University of Illinois
Bradford A. Benson
Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory
University of Chicago
Dan Bintley
James Clerk Maxwell Telescope
East Asian Observatory
Lindy Blackburn
Harvard University
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Raymond Blundell
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
K. L. Bouman
California Institute of Technology (Caltech)
G. C. Bower
Academia Sinica
University of Hawaii
Hope Boyce
McGill University
M. Bremer
Institut de Radioastronomie Millimétrique (IRAM)
C. D. Brinkerink
Radboud University
Roger Brissenden
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Harvard University
Silke Britzen
Max Planck Society
Avery E. Broderick
University of Waterloo
Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics
D. Broguière
Institut de Radioastronomie Millimétrique (IRAM)
Sandra Bustamente
University of Massachusetts
Do Young Byun
Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute
University of Science and Technology (UST)
J. E. Carlstrom
University of Chicago
The Enrico Fermi Institute
Chiara Ceccobello
Chalmers, Space, Earth and Environment, Astronomy and Plasmaphysics
A. Chael
Princeton University
Chi Kwan Chan
University of Arizona
Princeton University
Dominic O. Chang
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Harvard University
Koushik Chatterjee
Harvard University
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
S. Chatterjee
Cornell University
Ming Tang Chen
Cornell University
Yongjun Chen
Chinese Academy of Sciences
X. P. Cheng
Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute
I. Cho
Spanish National Research Council (CSIC)
Pierre Christian
Fairfield University
Nicholas S. Conroy
University of Illinois
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
John Conway
Chalmers, Space, Earth and Environment, Onsala Space Observatory
James M. Cordes
Cornell University
Thomas M. Crawford
University of Chicago
G. Crew
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
Alejandro Cruz-Osorio
Goethe University Frankfurt
Yuzhu Cui
Zhejiang Lab
Shanghai Jiao Tong University
Mariafelicia De Laurentis
Goethe University Frankfurt
University of Naples Federico II
National Institute for Nuclear Physics
R. P. Deane
University of Witwatersrand
Rhodes University
University of Pretoria
Jessica Dempsey
East Asian Observatory
Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy (ASTRON)
James Clerk Maxwell Telescope
Gregory Desvignes
Paris Observatory
Max Planck Society
Vedant Dhruv
University of Illinois
S. Doeleman
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Harvard University
Sean Dougal
University of Arizona
Sergio A. Dzib
Institut de Radioastronomie Millimétrique (IRAM)
Max Planck Society
Ralph P. Eatough
Max Planck Society
Chinese Academy of Sciences
Razieh Emami
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
H.D. Falcke
Radboud University
Joseph R. Farah
University of California
Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope Network
V. Fish
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
E. Fomalont
National Radio Astronomy Observatory
H. Alyson Ford
University of Arizona
R. Fraga-Encinas
Radboud University
William T. Freeman
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
Google Inc.
P. Friberg
East Asian Observatory
James Clerk Maxwell Telescope
Christian M. Fromm
Max Planck Society
Goethe University Frankfurt
University of Würzburg
Antonio Fuentes
Spanish National Research Council (CSIC)
Peter Galison
Harvard University
Roberto Garcia
Institut de Radioastronomie Millimétrique (IRAM)
Olivier Gentaz
Institut de Radioastronomie Millimétrique (IRAM)
Boris Georgiev
University of Waterloo
Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics
C. Goddi
University of Sao Paulo (USP)
National Institute for Nuclear Physics
Istituto nazionale di astrofisica (INAF)
University of Cagliari
Arturo I. Gómez-Ruiz
National Institute of Astrophysics, Optics and Electronics
National Council for Science and Technology Mexico
J. L. Gomez
Spanish National Research Council (CSIC)
Minfeng Gu
Chinese Academy of Sciences
M. Gurwell
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
K. Hada
National Astronomical Observatory of Japan
The Graduate University for Advanced Studies (SOKENDAI)
Daryl Haggard
McGill University
Kari Haworth
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Michael H. Hecht
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
R. Hesper
University of Groningen
Dirk Heumann
University of Arizona
Luis C. Ho
Beijing University of Technology
Paul Ho
East Asian Observatory
Academia Sinica
James Clerk Maxwell Telescope
Mareki Honma
University of Tokyo
The Graduate University for Advanced Studies (SOKENDAI)
National Astronomical Observatory of Japan
Chih Wei L. Huang
Academia Sinica
Lei Huang
Chinese Academy of Sciences
D. Hughes
National Institute of Astrophysics, Optics and Electronics
Shiro Ikeda
The Graduate University for Advanced Studies (SOKENDAI)
National Astronomical Observatory of Japan
The Institute of Statistical Mathematics
University of Tokyo
C. M. V. Impellizzeri
National Radio Astronomy Observatory
Leiden University
Georgia Institute of Technology
Astrophysical Journal
0004-637X (ISSN) 1538-4357 (eISSN)
Vol. 950 1 35Onsala space observatory infrastructure
Swedish Research Council (VR) (2017-00648), 2018-01-01 -- 2021-12-31.
RadioNet 4
European Commission (EC) (EC/H2020/730562), 2017-01-01 -- 2020-12-31.
Subject Categories (SSIF 2011)
Astronomy, Astrophysics and Cosmology
DOI
10.3847/1538-4357/acc586