Missing black holes in brightest cluster galaxies as evidence for the occurrence of superkicks in nature
arXiv:1405.2072 · doi:10.1093/mnras/stu2049
Abstract
We investigate the consequences of superkicks on the population of supermassive black holes (SMBHs) in the Universe residing in brightest cluster galaxies (BCGs). There is strong observational evidence that BCGs grew prominently at late times (up to a factor 2-4 in mass from z=1), mainly through mergers with satellite galaxies from the cluster, and they are known to host the most massive SMBHs ever observed. Those SMBHs are also expected to grow hierarchically, experiencing a series of mergers with other SMBHs brought in by merging satellites. Because of the net linear momentum taken away from the asymmetric gravitational wave emission, the remnant SMBH experiences a kick in the opposite direction. Kicks may be as large as ~5000 Km/s ("superkicks"), pushing the SMBHs out in the cluster outskirts for a time comparable to galaxy-evolution timescales. We predict, under a number of plausible assumptions, that superkicks can efficiently eject SMBHs from BCGs, bringing their occupation fraction down to a likely range 0.9<f<0.99 in the local Universe. Future thirty-meter-class telescopes like ELT and TMT will be capable of measuring SMBHs in hundreds of BCGs up to z=0.2, testing the occurrence of superkicks in nature and the strong-gravity regime of SMBH mergers.
19 pages, 11 figures, accepted for publication in MNRAS
References in corpus (31)
- The hierarchical formation of the brightest cluster galaxies
- An Observational Determination of the Bolometric Quasar Luminosity Function
- Concentration, Spin and Shape of Dark Matter Haloes as a Function of the Cosmological Model: WMAP1, WMAP3 and WMAP5 results
- Large Merger Recoils and Spin Flips From Generic Black-Hole Binaries
- Total recoil: the maximum kick from nonspinning black-hole binary inspiral
- Inspiral, merger and ringdown of unequal mass black hole binaries: a multipolar analysis
- Supermassive recoil velocities for binary black-hole mergers with antialigned spins
- On the prevalence of radio-loud AGN in brightest cluster galaxies: implications for AGN heating of cooling flows
- Alignment of the spins of supermassive black holes prior to coalescence
- Supermassive black hole binaries in gaseous and stellar circumnuclear discs: orbital dynamics and gas accretion
- Ejection of Supermassive Black Holes from Galaxy Cores
- On the final spin from the coalescence of two black holes
- An Over-Massive Black Hole in the Compact Lenticular Galaxy NGC1277
- Estimating the final spin of a binary black hole coalescence
- A calibration of the relation between the abundance of close galaxy pairs and the rate of galaxy mergers
- Dynamics of triple black hole systems in hierarchically merging massive galaxies
- The final mass and spin of black hole mergers
- Black Hole Growth in Hierarchical Galaxy Formation
- Self consistent model for the evolution of eccentric massive black hole binaries in stellar environments: implications for gravitational wave observations
- The Distribution of Recoil Velocities from Merging Black Holes
- Further insight into gravitational recoil
- Recoiling black holes: electromagnetic signatures, candidates, and astrophysical implications
- Relativistic Suppression of Black Hole Recoils
- Final spins from the merger of precessing binary black holes
- The VIMOS VLT Deep Survey: the contribution of minor mergers to the growth of L_B >= L*_B galaxies since z ~ 1 from spectroscopically identified pairs
- Can binary mergers produce maximally spinning black holes?
- Retaining Black Holes with Very Large Recoil Velocities
- Effects of post-Newtonian Spin Alignment on the Distribution of Black-Hole Recoils
- Compact massive objects in Virgo galaxies: the black hole population
- Strong Gravitational Lensing by the Super-massive cD Galaxy in Abell 3827
- Imprints of recoiling massive black-holes on the hot gas of early type galaxies
Cited by in corpus (17)
- Massive binary black holes in galactic nuclei and their path to coalescence
- Electromagnetic Counterparts to Massive Black Hole Mergers
- Prospects for gravitational-wave detection and supermassive black hole astrophysics with pulsar timing arrays
- Black hole kicks as new gravitational wave observables
- Remnant Black Hole Kicks and Implications for Hierarchical Mergers
- Formation of the largest galactic cores through binary scouring and gravitational wave recoil
- Signatures of the Many Supermassive Black Hole Mergers in a Cosmologically Forming Massive Early-Type Galaxy
- Predictions of a simple parametric model of hierarchical black hole mergers
- Amplification of superkicks in black-hole binaries through orbital eccentricity
- Drifting through the medium: kicks and self-propulsion of binaries within accretion disks and other environments
- Pulsar timing and its applications
- Dynamics and spin alignment in massive, gravito-turbulent circumbinary discs around supermassive black hole binaries
- The Bardeen-Petterson effect, disk breaking, and the spin orientations of supermassive black-hole binaries
- Astrophysics with the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna
- Optimizing Neural Network Surrogate Models: Application to Black Hole Merger Remnants
- Astrophysical and relativistic modeling of the recoiling black-hole candidate in quasar 3C 186
- Overmassive and Undermassive Massive Black Holes: The Role of Environment and Gravitational-Wave Recoils