Ejection of supermassive black holes and implications for merger rates in fuzzy dark matter haloes

Abstract

Fuzzy dark matter (FDM) consisting of ultra-light axions has been invoked to alleviate galactic-scale problems in the cold dark matter scenario. FDM fluctuations, created via the superposition of waves, can impact the motion of a central supermassive black hole (SMBH) immersed in an FDM halo. The SMBH will undergo a random walk, induced by FDM fluctuations, that can result in its ejection from the central region. This effect is strongest in dwarf galaxies, accounting for wandering SMBHs and the low detection rate of AGN in dwarf spheroidal galaxies. In addition, a lower bound on the allowed axion masses is inferred both for Sagittarius $A^{\ast }$ and heavier SMBH; to avoid ejection from the galactic centres, axion masses of the order of $10^{-22}\mathrm{eV}$ or lighter are excluded. Stronger limits are inferred for merging galaxies. We find that the event rate of SMBH mergers in FDM haloes and the associated SMBH growth rates can be reduced by at least an order of magnitude.

13 pages, 7 figures (principal results in figs 3-5). To appear in MNRAS

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Cited by in corpus (13)

• Ultra-Light Dark Matter
• Black hole merger simulations in wave dark matter environments
• On the Random Motion of Nuclear Objects in a Fuzzy Dark Matter Halo
• Analytical models of supermassive black holes in galaxies surrounded by dark matter halos
• On the Dynamical Heating of Dwarf Galaxies in a Fuzzy Dark Matter Halo
• Relaxation in a Fuzzy Dark Matter Halo. II. Self-consistent kinetic equations
• Tidal Suppression of Fuzzy Dark Matter Heating in Milky Way Satellite Galaxies
• Black Holes as Condensation Points of Fuzzy Dark Matter Cores
• Relativistic structure of a supermassive black hole embedded in the dark matter halo of NGC 4649 (M60)
• Supermassive black hole in NGC 4649 (M60) with a dark matter halo: Impact on shadow measurements and thermodynamic properties
• Equilibrium Core and Vortex Solutions of Bose Einstein Condensate Dark Matter around a Black Hole
• Constraining Axion Dark Matter with Galactic-Centre Resonant Dynamics
• Temporal Correlations Between Fuzzy Dark Matter and Baryonic Matter in Virialized Core-Halo Structures