Accuracy and Efficiency of Simulations of Black Hole Binaries using Adaptive Mesh Refinement

We explore how different choices of mesh refinement algorithms in several open-source numerical relativity codes affect the overall accuracy and speed of binary black hole merger simulations. We focus on accuracy of the amplitude and phase of lower-order modes (l<7) of the resulting gravitational waveforms, suppression of high-frequency errors modes associated with mesh refinement, and the overall scalability of the simulations.