2017/09/30 by Maya Fishbach, Daniel E. Holz · 197 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Astronomy and Astrophysical Research #Astrophysical Phenomena and Observations #Binary black hole #Binary number #Component (thermodynamics) #Cutoff #Mass distribution #Mass ratio #Pulsars and Gravitational Waves Research #Range (aeronautics) #Upper and lower bounds #astro-ph.HE #gr-qc
paper · pdf · doi:10.3847/2041-8213/aa9bf6
published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters 851(2), L25 (IOP Publishing) · includes more detailed analysis of mass ratio distribution; accepted for publication in ApJL
openalex created_date 2017/10/06 · arxiv created 2017/11/28 · openalex publication_date 2017/12/11 · arxiv updated 2017/12/21 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Abstract In LIGO’s O1 and O2 observational runs, the detectors were sensitive to stellar-mass binary black hole (BBH) coalescences with component masses up to , with binaries with primary masses above representing ≳90% of the total accessible sensitive volume. Nonetheless, of the 5.9 detections (GW150914, LVT151012, GW151226, GW170104, GW170608, and GW170814) reported by LIGO-Virgo, the most massive binary detected was GW150914 with a primary component mass of , far below the detection mass limit. Furthermore, there are theoretical arguments in favor of an upper mass gap, predicting an absence of black holes in the mass range . We argue that the absence of detected binary systems with component masses heavier than may be preliminary evidence for this upper mass gap. By allowing for the presence of a mass gap, we find weaker constraints on the shape of the underlying mass distribution of BBHs. We fit a power-law distribution with an upper mass cutoff to real and simulated BBH mass measurements, finding that the first 3.9 BBHs favor shallow power-law slopes and an upper mass cutoff . This inferred distribution is entirely consistent with the two recently reported detections, GW170608 and GW170814. We show that with ∼10 additional LIGO-Virgo BBH detections, fitting the BH mass distribution will provide strong evidence for an upper mass gap if one exists.