The QCD phase transition behind a PBH origin of LIGO/Virgo events?

Abstract

The best-motivated scenario for a sizable primordial black hole (PBH) contribution to the LIGO/Virgo binary black hole mergers invokes the QCD phase transition, which naturally enhances the probability to form PBH with masses of stellar scale. We reconsider the expected mass function associated not only to the QCD phase transition proper, but also the following particle antiparticle annihilation processes, and analyse the constraints on this scenario from a number of observations: The specific pattern in cosmic microwave background (CMB) anisotropies induced by accretion onto PBHs, CMB spectral distortions, gravitational wave searches, and direct counts of supermassive black holes (SMBHs) at high redshift. We find that the scenario is not viable, unless an ad hoc mass evolution for the PBH mass function and a cutoff in power-spectrum very close to the QCD scale are introduced by hand. Despite these negative results, we note that a future detection of coalescing binaries involving sub-solar PBHs has the potential to check the cosmological origin of SMBHs at the $e^{\pm }$ annihilation epoch, if indeed the PBH mass function is shaped by the changes to the equation of state driven by the thermal history of the universe.

arXiv comment13 pages and 11 figures. Few references and clarifications added, results unchanged; matches published version

References in corpus (53)

• Observation of Gravitational Waves from a Binary Black Hole Merger
• The clustering of galaxies in the completed SDSS-III Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey: cosmological analysis of the DR12 galaxy sample
• The Complete Light-curve Sample of Spectroscopically Confirmed Type Ia Supernovae from Pan-STARRS1 and Cosmological Constraints from The Combined Pantheon Sample
• The 6dF Galaxy Survey: Baryon Acoustic Oscillations and the Local Hubble Constant
• The Cosmic Linear Anisotropy Solving System (CLASS) II: Approximation schemes
• The Clustering of the SDSS DR7 Main Galaxy Sample I: A 4 per cent Distance Measure at z=0.15
• GWTC-3: Compact Binary Coalescences Observed by LIGO and Virgo During the Second Part of the Third Observing Run
• The Cosmic Microwave Background Spectrum from the Full COBE/FIRAS Data Set
• GW190521: A Binary Black Hole Merger with a Total Mass of $150M_{\odot }$
• Did LIGO detect dark matter?
• Limits on the Macho Content of the Galactic Halo from the EROS-2 Survey of the Magellanic Clouds
• Primordial Black Hole Scenario for the Gravitational-Wave Event GW150914
• Primordial Black Holes as Dark Matter: Recent Developments
• The Assembly of the First Massive Black Holes
• Inspiral-merger-ringdown waveforms for black-hole binaries with non-precessing spins
• The Cosmic Energy Inventory
• Cosmic microwave background limits on accreting primordial black holes
• The merger rate of primordial-black-hole binaries
• Primordial black hole constraints for extended mass functions
• Upper Limits on the Isotropic Gravitational-Wave Background from Advanced LIGO's and Advanced Virgo's Third Observing Run
• Constraints on Earth-mass primordial black holes from OGLE 5-year microlensing events
• MACHO Project Limits on Black Hole Dark Matter in the 1-30 Solar Mass Range
• Primordial black hole formation in the early universe: critical behaviour and self-similarity
• CMB bounds on disk-accreting massive Primordial Black Holes
• Probing the inflaton: Small-scale power spectrum constraints from measurements of the CMB energy spectrum
• Cosmic microwave background bounds on primordial black holes including dark matter halo accretion
• CMB at 2x2 order: the dissipation of primordial acoustic waves and the observable part of the associated energy release
• Cosmic Conundra Explained by Thermal History and Primordial Black Holes
• Primordial black holes with an accurate QCD equation of state
• On Effective Degrees of Freedom in the Early Universe
• Two populations of LIGO-Virgo black holes
• Primordial Black Hole Formation during First-Order Phase Transitions
• Growth of structure seeded by primordial black holes
• Searching for a subpopulation of primordial black holes in LIGO/Virgo gravitational-wave data
• Black Holes' Dark Dress: On the merger rate of a subdominant population of primordial black holes
• A Practical Theorem on Gravitational Wave Backgrounds
• Limits on primordial black holes from $\mu$ distortions in cosmic microwave background
• Evidence for primordial black hole dark matter from LIGO/Virgo merger rates
• The power spectrum on small scales: Robust constraints and comparing PBH methodologies
• Exotic energy injection with ExoCLASS: Application to the Higgs portal model and evaporating black holes
• Constraints on Primordial Black Holes: the Importance of Accretion
• NANOGrav results and LIGO-Virgo primordial black holes in axion-like curvaton model
• Can we distinguish astrophysical from primordial black holes via the stochastic gravitational wave background?
• Supermassive black holes formed by direct collapse of inflationary perturbations
• Could MACHOS be Primordial Black Holes formed during the QCD Epoch?
• Effects of Critical Collapse on Primordial Black-Hole Mass Spectra
• Broad search for gravitational waves from subsolar-mass binaries through LIGO and Virgo's third observing run
• Search for gravitational waves from the coalescence of sub-solar mass binaries in the first half of Advanced LIGO and Virgo's third observing run
• Prospects of discovering sub-solar primordial black holes using the stochastic gravitational wave background from third-generation detectors
• New thresholds for Primordial Black Hole formation during the QCD phase transition
• Primordial Black Holes: from Theory to Gravitational Wave Observations
• Baryogenesis from ultra-slow-roll inflation
• A boosted gravitational-wave background for primordial black holes with broad mass distributions and thermal features

Cited by in corpus (16)

• The NANOGrav 15-year Data Set: Search for Signals from New Physics
• From inflation to black hole mergers and back again: Gravitational-wave data-driven constraints on inflationary scenarios with a first-principle model of primordial black holes across the QCD epoch
• Primordial Black Holes
• PBH formation from overdensities in delayed vacuum transitions
• Search for scalar induced gravitational waves in the International Pulsar Timing Array Data Release 2 and NANOgrav 12.5 years datasets
• Simulations of PBH formation at the QCD epoch and comparison with the GWTC-3 catalog
• Primordial black hole formation during the QCD phase transition: threshold, mass distribution and abundance
• The effect of outflows on CMB bounds from Primordial Black Hole accretion
• Primordial Black Hole Formation during a Strongly Coupled Crossover
• Signatures of a High Temperature QCD Transition in the Early Universe
• Relaxing CMB bounds on Primordial Black Holes: the role of ionization fronts
• Primordial Black Holes and Induced Gravitational Waves from a Smooth Crossover beyond Standard Model
• Constraining the impact of standard model phase transitions on primordial black holes
• Simulations of Ellipsoidal Primordial Black Hole Formation
• Primordial Black-Hole-Based Pathways to Little Red Dots
• Extended mass distribution of PBHs during QCD phase transition: SGWB and mini-EMRIs