A note on the radiation reaction in the 2.5PN waveform from inspiralling binaries in quasi-circular orbits

Abstract

In this note we compute the contributions of the radiation reaction force in the 2.5 post-Newtonian (PN) gravitational wave polarizations for compact binaries in quasi-circular orbits. (i) We point out and correct an inconsistency in the derivation of [1]. (ii) We prove that all contributions from the radiation reaction in the 2.5PN waveform are actually negligible since they can be absorbed into a modification of the orbital phase at the 5PN order.