A new gravitational wave event reveals a binary black hole merger with total mass 190-265 solar masses, indicating black holes can form via gravitational-wave driven mergers beyond standard stellar channels.
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Assisted Inspirals of Stellar Mass Black Holes Embedded in AGN Disks: Solving the "Final AU Problem"
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abstract
We explore the evolution of stellar mass black hole binaries (BHBs) which are formed in the self-gravitating disks of active galactic nuclei (AGN). Hardening due to three-body scattering and gaseous drag are effective mechanisms that reduce the semi-major axis of a BHB to radii where gravitational waves take over, on timescales shorter than the typical lifetime of the AGN disk. Taking observationally-motivated assumptions for the rate of star formation in AGN disks, we find a rate of disk-induced BHB mergers ($\mathcal{R} \sim 3~{\rm yr}^{-1}~{\rm Gpc}^{-3}$, but with large uncertainties) that is comparable with existing estimates of the field rate of BHB mergers, and the approximate BHB merger rate implied by the recent Advanced LIGO detection of GW150914. BHBs formed thorough this channel will frequently be associated with luminous AGN, which are relatively rare within the sky error regions of future gravitational wave detector arrays. This channel could also possess a (potentially transient) electromagnetic counterpart due to super-Eddington accretion onto the stellar mass black hole following the merger.
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representative citing papers
Self-consistent spherical accretion simulations show cooling-enhanced growth of PBHs with radiative efficiency ~10^{-2} in the bremsstrahlung regime, yielding a critical seed mass of ~10^{-16} M_sun to consume a solar-mass star in a Hubble time.
SEOBNRv6EHM is a multipolar EOB model for eccentric planar-orbit BBHs calibrated to NR simulations, showing low waveform mismatches up to eccentricity 0.9.
Hardening binaries experience deterministic self-acceleration of their center of mass, induced precession, and plane rotation in uniform isotropic media, driving outward spiraling and eccentricity growth in all cases rather than circularization.
Gravitational-wave radiation from tidally driven Bohr crossings of black-hole axion clouds is controlled by outgoing two-level coherence, finite only for intermediate Landau-Zener sweep rates.
Head-on black-hole mergers next to a companion show Doppler- and redshift-shifted ringdown, lensing magnification behind the lens, and delayed echo images, with only tentative signs of resonant mode excitation.
AGN disk capture and merger rates scale as (H/R)^{-8} and drop by 10-20 orders of magnitude in thick magnetically supported disks compared to thin thermal disks.
GW231123's masses and high spins are consistent with primordial black holes that accreted mass and angular momentum in the early universe within the standard PBH framework.
Bayesian inference on LVK O1-O3 events with eccentric aligned-spin waveforms yields log10 Bayes factors of 1.77-4.75 favoring eccentricity for GW200129, GW190701 and GW200208_22, and >99.5% probability that at least one of 57 events is eccentric under an astrophysically motivated rate prior.
Future CE+ET detectors may detect lensed BNS kilonovae at ~0.5/yr via pointed follow-up of known galaxy lenses, while lensed sGRBs and afterglows remain rare or undetectable with current-generation facilities.
An isolated hierarchical triple channel with chemically homogeneous evolution and triple common envelope can produce PISN mass-gap BBH mergers matching GW190706 at ~22% of the observed rate.
A new framework projects perturbations onto resonant frequencies via Hansen coefficients to produce efficient coupled ODEs for orbital elements in GW-driven relativistic binaries, demonstrated on tidal fields and accretion disks.
Reduces elliptic triple outcome model to one free parameter, matches N-body simulations except at low angular momentum, and finds observably eccentric merger fractions of 2.6-4.4% in 10^5-10^7 solar mass clusters.
Semi-analytical models show AGN disks produce repeated BBH mergers with a high-mass tail beyond the pair-instability gap, more efficiently at low viscosity, with spin and mass-ratio signatures that can match events like GW190521.
Hydrodynamic drag makes BBH waveforms resemble higher-mass vacuum sources, biasing matched-filter chirp-mass estimates upward for LISA sources.
GWTC-5.0 analysis finds evidence for structure beyond a non-skewed Gaussian bulk in χ_eff, with suggestive mass-dependent excess of positive over negative spins outside the bulk at 13:1 odds in one mass bin.
Next-generation GW detector networks can constrain the spatial curvature parameter Ω_k to 1σ uncertainty of 0.029 using intermediate-mass binary black hole bright sirens.
GWTC-2.1 adds eight new high-significance compact binary coalescence events to the prior catalog, extending the observed black hole mass range and including candidates inside the pair-instability mass gap.
Baselines of 8-11 ms light travel time for two CE detectors provide a reasonable compromise for BBH sky localization, with third detectors eliminating multimodality for most or all events.
A decade of gravitational-wave data shows most merging stellar-mass black holes have small spins, with subdominant fast-spinning, misaligned, and hierarchical-merger populations.
citing papers explorer
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GW231123: a Binary Black Hole Merger with Total Mass 190-265 $M_{\odot}$
A new gravitational wave event reveals a binary black hole merger with total mass 190-265 solar masses, indicating black holes can form via gravitational-wave driven mergers beyond standard stellar channels.
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Accretion of Primordial Black Holes in Stellar Interiors
Self-consistent spherical accretion simulations show cooling-enhanced growth of PBHs with radiative efficiency ~10^{-2} in the bremsstrahlung regime, yielding a critical seed mass of ~10^{-16} M_sun to consume a solar-mass star in a Hubble time.
-
Accurate waveforms for generic planar-orbit binary black holes: The multipolar effective-one-body model SEOBNRv6EHM
SEOBNRv6EHM is a multipolar EOB model for eccentric planar-orbit BBHs calibrated to NR simulations, showing low waveform mismatches up to eccentricity 0.9.
-
Self-acceleration of Hardening Binaries
Hardening binaries experience deterministic self-acceleration of their center of mass, induced precession, and plane rotation in uniform isotropic media, driving outward spiraling and eccentricity growth in all cases rather than circularization.
-
Finite Coherence in Gravitational Waves from Tidally Excited Axion Clouds
Gravitational-wave radiation from tidally driven Bohr crossings of black-hole axion clouds is controlled by outgoing two-level coherence, finite only for intermediate Landau-Zener sweep rates.
-
Ringdown and lensing of triple systems
Head-on black-hole mergers next to a companion show Doppler- and redshift-shifted ringdown, lensing magnification behind the lens, and delayed echo images, with only tentative signs of resonant mode excitation.
-
Thick Disks, Thin Hopes: Suppressed Capture and Merger Rates in AGN
AGN disk capture and merger rates scale as (H/R)^{-8} and drop by 10-20 orders of magnitude in thick magnetically supported disks compared to thin thermal disks.
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GW231123: A Possible Primordial Black Hole Origin
GW231123's masses and high spins are consistent with primordial black holes that accreted mass and angular momentum in the early universe within the standard PBH framework.
-
Evidence for eccentricity in the population of binary black holes observed by LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA
Bayesian inference on LVK O1-O3 events with eccentric aligned-spin waveforms yields log10 Bayes factors of 1.77-4.75 favoring eccentricity for GW200129, GW190701 and GW200208_22, and >99.5% probability that at least one of 57 events is eccentric under an astrophysically motivated rate prior.
-
Prospect for Detection of Strongly Lensed Multi-messenger Signals of Binary Neutron Star Mergers
Future CE+ET detectors may detect lensed BNS kilonovae at ~0.5/yr via pointed follow-up of known galaxy lenses, while lensed sGRBs and afterglows remain rare or undetectable with current-generation facilities.
-
A Possible Triple Formation Scenario of Binary Black Hole Merge With One In Pair-instability Supernova Mass Gap
An isolated hierarchical triple channel with chemically homogeneous evolution and triple common envelope can produce PISN mass-gap BBH mergers matching GW190706 at ~22% of the observed rate.
-
Dynamics of Relativistic Binaries in Structured and Stochastic Environments: A Lagrange-Fourier-Hansen Framework
A new framework projects perturbations onto resonant frequencies via Hansen coefficients to produce efficient coupled ODEs for orbital elements in GW-driven relativistic binaries, demonstrated on tidal fields and accretion disks.
-
Intermediate States in Chaotic Triple Evolution and Applications to Black Hole Merger Statistics
Reduces elliptic triple outcome model to one free parameter, matches N-body simulations except at low angular momentum, and finds observably eccentric merger fractions of 2.6-4.4% in 10^5-10^7 solar mass clusters.
-
AGN-driven BBH mergers: Black hole populations and hierarchical growth across the AGN parameter space
Semi-analytical models show AGN disks produce repeated BBH mergers with a high-mass tail beyond the pair-instability gap, more efficiently at low viscosity, with spin and mass-ratio signatures that can match events like GW190521.
-
Retrieving the True Masses of Gravitational-wave Sources
Hydrodynamic drag makes BBH waveforms resemble higher-mass vacuum sources, biasing matched-filter chirp-mass estimates upward for LISA sources.
-
Evidence for additional structure in the effective spin distribution hints at multiple formation pathways in GWTC-5.0
GWTC-5.0 analysis finds evidence for structure beyond a non-skewed Gaussian bulk in χ_eff, with suggestive mass-dependent excess of positive over negative spins outside the bulk at 13:1 odds in one mass bin.
-
Shape of U: Measuring the Curvature of the Universe with Gravitational Waves
Next-generation GW detector networks can constrain the spatial curvature parameter Ω_k to 1σ uncertainty of 0.029 using intermediate-mass binary black hole bright sirens.
-
GWTC-2.1: Deep Extended Catalog of Compact Binary Coalescences Observed by LIGO and Virgo During the First Half of the Third Observing Run
GWTC-2.1 adds eight new high-significance compact binary coalescence events to the prior catalog, extending the observed black hole mass range and including candidates inside the pair-instability mass gap.
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Not too close! Evaluating the impact of the baseline on the localization of binary black holes by next-generation gravitational-wave detectors
Baselines of 8-11 ms light travel time for two CE detectors provide a reasonable compromise for BBH sky localization, with third detectors eliminating multimodality for most or all events.
-
The first decade of gravitational-wave measurements of black hole spins
A decade of gravitational-wave data shows most merging stellar-mass black holes have small spins, with subdominant fast-spinning, misaligned, and hierarchical-merger populations.