The Fates of Merging Supermassive Black Holes and a Proposal for a New Class of X-Ray Sources

Abstract

We perform N-body simulations on some of the most massive galaxies extracted from a cosmological simulation of hierarchical structure formation with total masses in the range $10^{12}{M}_{\odot }<M_{tot}<3\times 10^{13}{M}_{\odot }$ from $4\ge z\ge 0$. After galactic mergers, we track the dynamical evolution of the infalling black holes (BHs) around their host's central BHs. From 11 different simulations, we find that, of the 86 infalling BHs with masses > $10^4{M}_{\odot }$, 36 merge with their host's central BH, 13 are ejected from their host galaxy, and 37 are still orbiting at $z=0$. Across all galaxies, 33 BHs are kicked to a higher orbit after close interactions with the central BH binary or multiple, after which only one of them merged with their hosts. These orbiting BHs should be detectable by their anomalous (not Low Mass X-ray Binary) spectra. The X-ray luminosities of the orbiting massive BHs at z=0 are in the range $10^{28}-10^{43}$ $\mathrm{erg}{\mathrm{s}}^{-1}$, with a currently undetectable median value of $10^{33}$ $\mathrm{erg}{\mathrm{s}}^{-1}$. However, the most luminous $\sim$5\% should be detectable by existing X-ray facilities.

References in corpus (71)

• Simulating the joint evolution of quasars, galaxies and their large-scale distribution
• Coevolution (Or Not) of Supermassive Black Holes and Host Galaxies
• The Relation between Black Hole Mass, Bulge Mass, and Near-Infrared Luminosity
• On the Black Hole Mass - Bulge Mass Relation
• Nuclear Activity in Nearby Galaxies
• The Assembly and Merging History of Supermassive Black Holes in Hierarchical Models of Galaxy Formation
• The Two Phases of Galaxy Formation
• Chandra X-ray Spectroscopic Imaging of Sgr A* and the Central Parsec of the Galaxy
• Confirmation of the remarkable compactness of massive quiescent galaxies at z~2.3: early-type galaxies did not form in a simple monolithic collapse
• Chandra Cluster Cosmology Project II: Samples and X-ray Data Reduction
• How do galaxies populate Dark Matter halos?
• Nonthermal Electrons in Radiatively Inefficient Accretion Flow Models of Sagittarius A*
• The stochastic gravitational-wave background from massive black hole binary systems: implications for observations with Pulsar Timing Arrays
• Large Merger Recoils and Spin Flips From Generic Black-Hole Binaries
• Maximum gravitational recoil
• Total recoil: the maximum kick from nonspinning black-hole binary inspiral
• Thermal Conduction in Clusters of Galaxies
• Supermassive recoil velocities for binary black-hole mergers with antialigned spins
• Radiatively Inefficient Accretion in Nearby Galaxies
• Galaxy formation in WMAP1 and WMAP7 cosmologies
• Galaxy Cluster Baryon Fractions Revisited
• Stellar mass -- halo mass relation and star formation efficiency in high-mass halos
• Gravitational waves from resolvable massive black hole binary systems and observations with Pulsar Timing Arrays
• A Population of Short-Period Variable Quasars from PTF as Supermassive Black Hole Binary Candidates
• Galaxy Properties from the Ultra-violet to the Far-Infrared: Lambda-CDM models confront observations
• Systematic investigation of the expected gravitational wave signal from supermassive black hole binaries in the pulsar timing band
• Radiative and Momentum Based Mechanical AGN Feedback in a 3-Dimensional Galaxy Evolution Code
• Hangup Kicks: Still Larger Recoils by Partial Spin/Orbit Alignment of Black-Hole Binaries
• Gravitational Recoil From Accretion-Aligned Black-Hole Binaries
• Implementing Few-Body Algorithmic Regularization with Post-Newtonian Terms
• On the soft X-ray spectrum of cooling flows
• Dual black holes in merger remnants. II: spin evolution and gravitational recoil
• Building galaxies by accretion and in-situ star formation
• A Dynamical Model for Hot Gas in the Galactic Center
• Further insight into gravitational recoil
• Formation of Massive Black Holes in Galactic Nuclei: Runaway Tidal Encounters
• Dynamical evolution of intermediate mass black holes and their observable signatures in the nearby Universe
• The integrated stellar content of dark matter halos
• The Final Parsec Problem
• Can dry merging explain the size evolution of early-type galaxies?
• Algorithmic regularization with velocity-dependent forces
• Effects of gravitational-wave recoil on the dynamics and growth of supermassive black holes
• The Nature of Damped Lyman Alpha Systems and Their Hosts in the Standard Cold Dark Matter Universe
• Interactions between multiple supermassive black holes in galactic nuclei: a solution to the final parsec problem
• Gravitational waves and stalled satellites from massive galaxy mergers at z <= 1
• Wandering Supermassive Black Holes in Milky Way Mass Halos
• Testing the binary hypothesis: pulsar timing constraints on supermassive black hole binary candidates
• Formation of galactic nuclei with multiple supermassive black holes at high redshifts
• Nonlinear Gravitational Recoil from the Mergers of Precessing Black-Hole Binaries
• Understanding black hole mass assembly via accretion and mergers at late times in cosmological simulations
• Mergers of Supermassive Black Holes in Astrophysical Environments
• From galactic nuclei to the halo outskirts: tracing supermassive black holes across cosmic history and environments
• On the Origin of the Hubble Sequence: I. Insights on Galaxy Color Migration from Cosmological Simulations
• HST/WFC3 grism observations of $z\sim 1$ clusters: The cluster vs. field stellar mass-size relation and evidence for size growth of quiescent galaxies from minor mergers
• X-ray scaling relations of early-type galaxies
• Environmentally Driven Global Evolution of Galaxies
• Modeling maximum astrophysical gravitational recoil velocities
• Hubble Space Telescope WFC3 Grism Spectroscopy and Imaging of a Growing Compact Galaxy at z=1.9
• The divergence of neighboring magnetic field lines and fast-particle diffusion in strong magnetohydrodynamic turbulence, with application to thermal conduction in galaxy clusters
• Low density, radiatively inefficient rotating-accretion flow onto a black hole
• Coincidences between OVI and OVII Lines: Insights from High Resolution Simulations of the Warm-Hot Intergalactic Medium
• Massive black hole and Population III galaxy formation in over-massive dark matter halos with violent merger histories
• No tension between assembly models of supermassive black hole binaries and pulsar observations
• Composition of Low Redshift Halo Gas
• The growth of galactic bulges through mergers in LCDM haloes revisited. II. Morphological mix evolution
• Transition of BH feeding from the quiescent regime into star-forming cold disk regime
• Gravitational waves from supermassive black hole binaries in ultra-luminous infrared galaxies
• A Dynamical Potential-Density Pair for Star Clusters With Nearly Isothermal Interiors
• Far-Infrared Properties of Lyman Break Galaxies from Cosmological Simulations
• Recoiling Supermassive Black Hole Escape Velocities from Dark Matter Halos
• Deep Chandra observations of X-ray point sources in M87

Cited by in corpus (3)

• Intermediate Mass Black Hole Formation in compact Young Massive Star Clusters
• Origins and Demographics of Wandering Black Holes
• Cosmological DCBH formation sites hostile for their growth