Eccentric Evolution of Supermassive Black Hole Binaries

Details Eccentric Evolution of Supermassive Black Hole Binaries Eccentric Evolution of Supermassive Black Hole Binaries

Apr 2011

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2011apj...731l...9i&link_type=abstract

The Astrophysical Journal Letters, Volume 731, Issue 1, article id. L9 (2011).

Physics

8

Black Hole Physics, Celestial Mechanics, Galaxies: Nuclei

Scientific paper

In recent numerical simulations, it has been found that the eccentricity of supermassive black hole (SMBH)-intermediate black hole (IMBH) binaries grows toward unity through interactions with the stellar background. This increase of eccentricity reduces the merging timescale of the binary through the gravitational radiation to a value well below the Hubble time. It also gives a theoretical explanation of the existence of eccentric binaries such as that in OJ287. In self-consistent N-body simulations, this increase of eccentricity is always observed. On the other hand, the result of the scattering experiment between SMBH binaries and field stars indicated that the eccentricity dose not change significantly. This discrepancy leaves the high eccentricity of the SMBH binaries in N-body simulations unexplained. Here, we present a stellar-dynamical mechanism that drives the increase of the eccentricity of an SMBH binary with a large mass ratio. There are two key processes involved. The first one is the Kozai mechanism under a non-axisymmetric potential, which effectively randomizes the angular momenta of surrounding stars. The other is the selective ejection of stars with prograde orbits. Through these two mechanisms, field stars extract the orbital angular momentum of the SMBH binary. Our proposed mechanism causes the increase in the eccentricity of most of SMBH binaries, resulting in the rapid merger through gravitational wave radiation. Our result has given a definite solution to the "last-parsec problem."

Affiliated with

Also associated with

No associations

Rating

Eccentric Evolution of Supermassive Black Hole Binaries does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.

If you have personal experience with Eccentric Evolution of Supermassive Black Hole Binaries, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Eccentric Evolution of Supermassive Black Hole Binaries will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

Comments { 0 }

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-1184682