The Origin of Binary Black Holes Mergers
arXiv:1910.11358 · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ab792a
Abstract
Recently Venumadhav et al. (2019) proposed a new pipeline to analyze LIGO-Virgo's O1-O2 data and discovered eight new binary black hole (BBH) mergers, including a high effective spin, chi_{eff}, one. This discovery sheds new light on the origin of the observed BBHs and the dynamical capture vs. field binaries debate. Using a new statistical approach, we show that, while isotropic models are not ruled out, the observed chi_{eff} distribution favors field binaries, whose chi_{eff} is determined by tidal forces and wind losses, over capture. However, given the current limited sample size, capture scenarios (isotropic models) cannot be ruled out. Observations of roughly a hundred merges will enable us to distinguish between the different formation scenarios. However, if as expected, both formation channels operate it may be difficult to resolve their exact fraction.
Accepted for publication in ApJ
References in corpus (14)
- Cosmic Star Formation History
- Formation of Double Neutron Star Systems
- Gravitational waves from scattering of stellar-mass black holes in galactic nuclei
- The effect of massive binaries on stellar populations and supernova progenitors
- Illuminating Black Hole Binary Formation Channels with Spins in Advanced LIGO
- Distinguishing Spin-Aligned and Isotropic Black Hole Populations With Gravitational Waves
- Binary star progenitors of long gamma-ray bursts
- A Highly Spinning and Aligned Binary Black Hole Merger in the Advanced LIGO First Observing Run
- Mergers of Stellar-Mass Black Holes in Nuclear Star Clusters
- Searching for Eccentricity: Signatures of Dynamical Formation in the First Gravitational-Wave Transient Catalogue of LIGO and Virgo
- Solving puzzles of GW150914 by primordial black holes
- Gamma-Ray Bursts from tidally spun-up Wolf-Rayet stars?
- Double Neutron Stars: Evidence For Two Different Neutron-Star Formation Mechanisms
- Spins of primordial binary black holes before coalescence
Cited by in corpus (11)
- Merger rate density of Population III binary black holes below, above, and in the pair-instability mass gap
- Binary Black Hole Mergers from LIGO/Virgo O1 and O2: Population Inference Combining Confident and Marginal Events
- A trend in the effective spin distribution of LIGO binary black holes with mass
- Common Envelope Wind Tunnel: The Effects of Binary Mass Ratio and Implications for the Accretion-Driven Growth of LIGO Binary Black Holes
- Populating the Black Hole Mass Gaps In Stellar Clusters: General Relations and Upper Limits
- Spin misalignment of black hole binaries from young star clusters: implications for the origin of gravitational waves events
- Upgraded waveform model of eccentric binary black hole based on effective-one-body-numerical-relativity for spin-aligned binary black holes
- Eccentric Mergers in AGN Discs: Influence of the Supermassive Black-Hole on Three-body Interactions
- Being Careful with the Field Formation Interpretation of GW190412
- The astrophysical odds of GW151216
- Are binary black hole mergers and long gamma-ray bursts drawn from the same black hole population?