Three-Body Encounters of Black Holes in Globular Clusters

Abstract

Evidence has been mounting for the existence of black holes with masses from 10^2 to 10^4 M_Solar associated with stellar clusters. Such intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs) will encounter other black holes in the dense cores of these clusters. The binaries produced in these interactions will be perturbed by other objects as well thus changing the orbital characteristics of the binaries. These binaries and their subsequent mergers due to gravitational radiation are important sources of gravitational waves. We present the results of numerical simulations of high mass ratio encounters, which help clarify the interactions of intermediate-mass black holes in globular clusters and help determine what types of detectable gravitational wave signatures are likely.

arXiv comment4 pages, 3 figures to appear in the proceedings of The Astrophysics of Gravitational Wave Sources, College Park, MD, 24-26 April 2003

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