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The effect of mass-segregation on gravitational wave sources near massive black holes

2 Pith papers cite this work. Polarity classification is still indexing.

2 Pith papers citing it
abstract

Gravitational waves (GWs) from the inspiral of compact remnants (CRs) into massive black holes (MBHs) will be observable to cosmological distances. While a CR spirals in, 2-body scattering by field stars may cause it to fall into the MBH before reaching a short period orbit that would give an observable signal. As a result, only CRs very near (~0.01 pc) the MBH can spiral in successfully. In a multi-mass stellar population, the heaviest objects sink to the center, where they are more likely to slowly spiral into the MBH without being swallowed prematurely. We study how mass-segregation modifies the stellar distribution and the rate of GW events. We find that the inspiral rate per galaxy for white dwarfs is 30 per Gyr, for neutron stars 6 per Gyr, and for stellar black holes (SBHs) 250 per Gyr. The high rate for SBHs is due to their extremely steep density profile, n_{BH}(r)\propto r^{-2}. The GW detection rate will be dominated by SBHs.

citation-role summary

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citation-polarity summary

fields

gr-qc 1 hep-ph 1

years

2026 1 2023 1

verdicts

UNVERDICTED 2

roles

background 1

polarities

background 1

representative citing papers

Boosted Dark Matter from Sagittarius A$^\star$

hep-ph · 2026-06-29 · unverdicted · novelty 5.0

The nuclear star cluster around Sgr A* is the dominant source of gravitationally boosted dark matter in the Milky Way, with particles up to ~25,000 km/s that enhance sub-GeV detection prospects independently of the DM model.

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Showing 2 of 2 citing papers.

  • Boosted Dark Matter from Sagittarius A$^\star$ hep-ph · 2026-06-29 · unverdicted · none · ref 35 · internal anchor

    The nuclear star cluster around Sgr A* is the dominant source of gravitationally boosted dark matter in the Milky Way, with particles up to ~25,000 km/s that enhance sub-GeV detection prospects independently of the DM model.

  • Waveform Modelling for the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna gr-qc · 2023-11-02 · unverdicted · none · ref 69 · internal anchor

    A review of existing waveform models for LISA sources and the challenges that must still be overcome.