2025/12/23 by Xiao-Tian Xu, Norbert Langer, Xu, Xiao-Tian +8
Physics and Astronomy · #Angular momentum #Astronomy and Astrophysical Research #Astrophysical Phenomena and Observations #Binary black hole #Binary number #Binary star #Black hole (networking) #Gravitation #Gravitational wave #Population #Pulsars and Gravitational Waves Research #astro-ph.HE #astro-ph.SR #gr-qc
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2512.20054
openalex publication_date 2025/12/23 · openalex created_date 2025/12/25 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
The vast majority of massive binary systems in the universe is evidently unsuited to produce merging binary black holes. However, several narrow evolutionary paths of isolated massive binaries towards this goal have recently been identified. Due to the high degree of simplification and assumptions applied in previous modelling of these paths, conclusions remained vague so far. For one of these paths, the stable mass transfer channel, we now construct detailed binary evolution models which include internal differential rotation as well as mass and angular momentum transfer between the stars, all the way from the zero-age main sequence to the formation of the black holes, only skipping the rapid late burning stages. This allows us to follow the mass and chemical structure evolution of the mass accreting component, which turns out to have a key influence on the phase of reverse mass transfer, that allows the obtained black hole spins and mass ratios to naturally fall into the regime observed for the gravitational-wave source in the 10--25M_\odot primary black hole mass range. As for this channel, also a large number of progenitor binaries are known, we conclude that it likely contributes to the observed population of gravitational wave sources.