The effect of interstellar medium on LVK's black holes

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Author: Ghodla, Sohan
Format: Preprint
Published: 2024
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author Ghodla, Sohan
author_facet Ghodla, Sohan
contents Gravitational radiation alone is not efficient in hardening the orbit of a wide binary black hole (BBH). By employing a toy model for the interstellar medium (ISM) surrounding BBHs, here we discuss the effect of this baryonic medium on BBH dynamics. Depending on the BBH's mass, we show that a binary surrounded by an isotropic cold neutral medium (i.e., an asymptotic temperature $T_{\infty} \approx 100$ K) with a time-averaged particle density of $\langle n_H \rangle = \mathcal{O}(1)$ cm$^{-3}$ can play a significant role in hardening the binary orbit over a $\mathcal{O}(10^9)$ yr time scale. Additionally, this causes the black hole's mass to grow at a rate $\propto m^2$. We thus discuss the impact of the ISM on the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA (LVK) observables and quantify the properties of the ISM under which the latter could act as an additional important pathway for driving a subset of LVK's BBH mergers.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2405_17863
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle The effect of interstellar medium on LVK's black holes
Ghodla, Sohan
High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena
Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics
Gravitational radiation alone is not efficient in hardening the orbit of a wide binary black hole (BBH). By employing a toy model for the interstellar medium (ISM) surrounding BBHs, here we discuss the effect of this baryonic medium on BBH dynamics. Depending on the BBH's mass, we show that a binary surrounded by an isotropic cold neutral medium (i.e., an asymptotic temperature $T_{\infty} \approx 100$ K) with a time-averaged particle density of $\langle n_H \rangle = \mathcal{O}(1)$ cm$^{-3}$ can play a significant role in hardening the binary orbit over a $\mathcal{O}(10^9)$ yr time scale. Additionally, this causes the black hole's mass to grow at a rate $\propto m^2$. We thus discuss the impact of the ISM on the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA (LVK) observables and quantify the properties of the ISM under which the latter could act as an additional important pathway for driving a subset of LVK's BBH mergers.
title The effect of interstellar medium on LVK's black holes
topic High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena
Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2405.17863