  Current observations of double neutron stars provide us with a wealth of
information that we can use to investigate their evolutionary history and the
physical conditions of neutron star formation. Understanding this history and
formation conditions further allow us to make theoretical predictions for the
formation of other double compact objects with one or two black hole components
and assess the detectability of such systems by ground-based gravitational-wave
interferometers. In this paper we summarize our group's body of work in the
past few years and we place our conclusions and current understanding in the
framework of other work in this area of astrophysical research.
