2017/02/28 by Barry McKernan, B. McKernan, K. E. S. Ford +13 · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · #Active galactic nucleus #Astrophysical Phenomena and Observations #Black hole (networking) #Gamma-ray bursts and supernovae #Interferometry #LIGO #Observable #Observatory #Pulsars and Gravitational Waves Research #Spin (aerodynamics) #astro-ph.GA #astro-ph.HE #gr-qc
paper · pdf · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/aadae5
published as 2018ApJ...866...66M · 9pages, 2 figures, revised version submitted to ApJ. Comments welcome
openalex created_date 2017/03/16 · arxiv created 2018/01/30 · openalex publication_date 2018/10/10 · arxiv updated 2018/10/23 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/06
Abstract Black hole (BH) mergers detectable with the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) can occur in active galactic nucleus (AGN) disks. Here we parameterize the merger rates, the mass spectrum, and the spin spectrum of BHs in AGN disks. The predicted merger rate spans ∼10 −3 –10 4 Gpc −1 yr −1 , so upper limits from LIGO (<212 Gpc −1 yr −1 ) already constrain it. The predicted mass spectrum has the form of a broken power law, consisting of a pre-existing BH power-law mass spectrum and a harder power-law mass spectrum resulting from mergers. The predicted spin spectrum is multipeaked with the evolution of retrograde spin BHs in the gas disk playing a key role. We outline the large uncertainties in each of these LIGO observables for this channel and we discuss ways in which they can be constrained in the future.