Can we finally track black holes on wild, eccentric orbits?

Most gravitational-wave models assume black holes spiral in on near-circular paths, but dynamically formed binaries can have highly elongated orbits — a signature of chaotic stellar environments. SEOBNRv6EHM keeps waveform errors below 2% for eccentricities up to 0.9, validated against nearly 1,000 numerical-relativity simulations including captures and scattering flybys. Running 2–6× faster than comparable models, it makes parameter estimation for eccentric binaries in current and future detectors practically feasible.