One Channel to Rule Them All? Constraining the Origins of Binary Black Holes Using Multiple Formation Pathways

Zevin, M.; Bavera, Simone S.; Berry, C. P. L.; Kalogera, V.; Fragos, Tassos; Marchant, Pablo; Rodriguez, Carl L.; Antonini, Fabio; Holz, D. E.; Pankow, C.

doi:10.3847/1538-4357/abe40e

Cited by 272 publications

(291 citation statements)

References 185 publications

(205 reference statements)

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“…For example, the posterior distributions of the mixing fraction of the NSC, YSC and Field channels peak at values significantly larger than zero in the A5F05, LONG_DELAY, SHORT_DELAY, HIGH_SPIN, BROAD_VESC, and NARROW_VESC models. This result is in agreement with previous work [189][190][191][192].…”

Section: Comparison With Bbhs In Gwtc-2supporting

confidence: 94%

Mass and Rate of Hierarchical Black Hole Mergers in Young, Globular and Nuclear Star Clusters

et al. 2021

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Hierarchical mergers are one of the distinctive signatures of binary black hole (BBH) formation through dynamical evolution. Here, we present a fast semi-analytic approach to simulate hierarchical mergers in nuclear star clusters (NSCs), globular clusters (GCs) and young star clusters (YSCs). Hierarchical mergers are more common in NSCs than they are in both GCs and YSCs because of the different escape velocity. The mass distribution of hierarchical BBHs strongly depends on the properties of first-generation BBHs, such as their progenitor’s metallicity. In our fiducial model, we form black holes (BHs) with masses up to ∼103 M⊙ in NSCs and up to ∼102 M⊙ in both GCs and YSCs. When escape velocities in excess of 100 km s−1 are considered, BHs with mass >103 M⊙ are allowed to form in NSCs. Hierarchical mergers lead to the formation of BHs in the pair instability mass gap and intermediate-mass BHs, but only in metal-poor environments. The local BBH merger rate in our models ranges from ∼10 to ∼60 Gpc−3 yr−1; hierarchical BBHs in NSCs account for ∼10−2–0.2 Gpc−3 yr−1, with a strong upper limit of ∼10 Gpc−3 yr−1. When comparing our models with the second gravitational-wave transient catalog, we find that multiple formation channels are favored to reproduce the observed BBH population.

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Section: Comparison With Bbhs In Gwtc-2supporting

confidence: 94%

Mass and Rate of Hierarchical Black Hole Mergers in Young, Globular and Nuclear Star Clusters

et al. 2021

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“…Black holes formed in prior binary black hole mergers (Bellovary et al 2016;Antonini et al 2019;Rodriguez et al 2019;Gerosa & Berti 2019;Di Carlo et al 2019;Yang et al 2019;Doctor et al 2020;Kimball et al 2020;McKernan et al 2020;González et al 2021;Fragione et al 2020;Weatherford et al 2021) are not captured by the isolated black hole mass function in Equation (3). These can produce significant numbers of black holes with mass larger than M BHMG (Miller & Hamilton 2002;Gerosa & Berti 2017;Rodriguez et al 2019;Zevin et al 2021;Kimball et al 2021;Rodriguez et al 2021). Assuming that the rate of black hole mergers is independent of the progenitor masses, second-generation black holes of mass M BH that form from the merger of two lighter first-generation black holes of mass M a , M b will be distributed according to…”

Section: Astrophysical Mass Functionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Find the Gap: Black Hole Population Analysis with an Astrophysically Motivated Mass Function

Baxter

Croon

McDermott

et al. 2021

ApJL

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We introduce a novel black hole mass function that realistically models the physics of pair-instability supernovae with a minimal number of parameters. Applying this to all events in the LIGO-Virgo Gravitational-Wave Transient Catalog 2 (GWTC-2), we detect a peak at. Repeating the analysis without the black holes from the event GW190521, we find this feature at M BHMG = 54 ± 6 M e . These results establish the edge of the anticipated "black hole mass gap" at a value compatible with the expectation from standard stellar structure theory. The mass gap manifests itself as a discontinuity in the mass function and is populated by a distinct, less-abundant population of higher-mass black holes. We find that the primary black hole population scales with power-law index −1.95 ± 0.51 (−1.97 ± 0.44) with (without) GW190521, consistent with models of star formation. Using Bayesian techniques, we establish that our mass function fits a new catalog of black hole masses approximately as well as pre-existing phenomenological mass functions. We also remark on the implications of these results for constraining or discovering new phenomena in nuclear and particle physics. Unified Astronomy Thesaurus concepts: Astrophysical black holes (98); Black holes (162); Gravitational waves (678); Particle astrophysics (96); Gravitational wave astronomy (675); Nuclear astrophysics (1129); Stellar evolution (1599); Stellar populations (1622); Population III stars (1285); Helium burning (716)

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“…Important discoveries contained in the first Gravitational Wave Transient Catalog (Abbott et al 2019) include the discovery of BHs more massive than those detected through electromagnetic observations in the Galaxy (Abbott et al 2016) and the direct association of short gamma-ray bursts with binary neutron star mergers (Abbott et al 2017). The increased size of the sample on the second Gravitational Wave Transient Catalog (Abbott et al 2020a) points to additional features in the proper-ties of merging binary BHs, indicative of the contribution of multiple formation channels (Abbott et al 2021;Zevin et al 2021). Accurate predictions from different formation channels are then necessary to understand their relative contributions.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The role of mass transfer and common envelope evolution in the formation of merging binary black holes

Marchant

Pappas

Gallegos-Garcia

et al. 2021

A&A

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As the number of merging binary black holes observed with ground-based gravitational-wave detectors grows, increasingly accurate theoretical models are required to compare them to the observed sample and disentangle contributions from multiple channels. In formation models involving isolated binary stars, important uncertainties remain regarding the stability of mass transfer and common-envelope evolution. To study some of these uncertainties, we have computed binary simulations using the MESA code consisting of a 30 M⊙ star in a low metallicity (Z⊙/10) environment with a black-hole companion. We have developed an updated prescription to compute mass transfer rates including the possibility of outflows from outer Lagrangian points, as well as a method to self-consistently determine the core-envelope boundary in cases where there is common-envelope evolution. We find that binaries survive common-envelope evolution only if unstable mass transfer happens after the formation of a deep convective envelope, resulting in a narrow range (0.2 dex) in period for successful envelope ejection. All cases where binary interaction is initiated with a radiative envelope have large binding energies (∼1050 erg), and they result in mergers during the common-envelope phase even under the assumption that all the internal and recombination energy of the envelope, as well as the energy from an inspiral, is used to eject the envelope. This is independent of whether or not helium is ignited in the core of the donor, conditions under which various rapid-population synthesis calculations assume a successful envelope ejection is possible. Moreover, we find that the critical mass ratio for instability is such that across a large range in initial orbital periods (∼1−1000 days), merging binary black holes can be formed via stable mass transfer. A large fraction of these systems undergo overflow of their L2 equipotential, in which case we find that stable mass transfer produces merging binary black holes even under extreme assumptions of mass and angular momentum outflows. Our conclusions are limited to the study of one donor mass at a single metallicity, but they suggest that population synthesis calculations overestimate the formation rate of merging binary black holes produced by common-envelope evolution and that stable mass transfer could dominate the formation rate from isolated binaries. This is in agreement with a few other recent studies. Further work is required to extend these results to different masses and metallicities as well as to understand how they can be incorporated into rapid population synthesis calculations.

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One Channel to Rule Them All? Constraining the Origins of Binary Black Holes Using Multiple Formation Pathways

Cited by 272 publications

References 185 publications

Mass and Rate of Hierarchical Black Hole Mergers in Young, Globular and Nuclear Star Clusters

Mass and Rate of Hierarchical Black Hole Mergers in Young, Globular and Nuclear Star Clusters

Find the Gap: Black Hole Population Analysis with an Astrophysically Motivated Mass Function

The role of mass transfer and common envelope evolution in the formation of merging binary black holes

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