activity
20202026
most citedMaximum Black Hole mass across Cosmic Time

114 citations · 342 across the 23 of their papers we have counts for

collaborators

26 papers

astro-ph.SR2026

The physical origin of the maximum stellar size

Gautham N. Sabhahit, Jorick S. Vink

One might expect the most massive stars to also be the largest by size, yet they are not, and this has puzzled astronomers for decades. The Eddington limit sets an upper bound to s…

astro-ph.SR2026

Hydrodynamical mass-loss rates for Very Massive Stars II. New theoretical mass-loss predictions at solar metallicity (Z = 0.02)

Gautham N. Sabhahit, Jorick S. Vink, Andreas A. C. Sander

The evolutionary pathways and ultimate fates of very massive stars are governed primarily by mass loss through radiatively driven winds. We present a new theoretical mass-loss pres…

astro-ph.SR2026

On the Robustness of Bi-Stability Jump Predictions

Jorick S. Vink, Gautham N. Sabhahit, Andreas A. C. Sander

The bi-stability jump is a long-standing theoretical prediction of radiatively driven wind theory, associated with Fe IV/III recombination around T = 21000 - 25000 K. While most th…

astro-ph.SR2026

The winds of OBA hypergiants and luminous blue variables: Dynamically-consistent atmosphere models reveal multiple wind regimes

Matheus Bernini-Peron, Andreas A. C. Sander, Gautham N. Sabhahit +3

OBA hypergiants (OBAHGs) are evolved massive stars with notable wind features in their optical spectrum. Located at the cool edge of the line-driven wind regime, many are candidate…

astro-ph.SR2025

Hydrodynamical mass-loss rates for Very Massive Stars. I. Investigating the wind kink

Gautham N. Sabhahit, Jorick S. Vink, Andreas A. C. Sander

Radiation-driven winds are ubiquitous in massive stars, but in Very Massive Stars (VMSs), mass loss dominates their evolution, chemical yields, and ultimate fate. Theoretical predi…

astro-ph.HE2025

Black Holes at high and low metallicity

Jorick S. Vink, Gautham N. Sabhahit, Ethan R. J. Winch

At the end of their lives the most massive stars collapse into black holes (BHs). The detection of an 85 BH from GW 190521 appeared to challenge the upper-mass limit im…

astro-ph.SR2025

Minimum and maximum mass-luminosity relations for stripped stars

Gautham N. Sabhahit, Jorick S. Vink, Andreas A. C. Sander +1

Envelope stripping, whether through single-star wind mass loss or binary mass transfer, is a key evolutionary pathway for the formation of classical Wolf-Rayet stars and lower-mass…

astro-ph.SR2025★ 4 cited

Metal-poor single Wolf-Rayet stars: The interplay of optically thick winds and rotation

Lumen Boco, Michela Mapelli, Andreas A. C. Sander +7

The Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) hosts 12 known Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars, seven of which are apparently single. Their formation is a challenge for current stellar evolution models bec…

astro-ph.SR2025★ 2 cited

Near-Eddington mass loss of hydrogen-rich Wolf-Rayet stars

Roel R. Lefever, Andreas A. C. Sander, Matheus Bernini-Peron +6

Context. Very massive clusters and regions of intense star formation such as the center of our Milky Way contain young, hydrogen-burning stars very close to the Eddington Limit. Fo…

astro-ph.SR2025★ 4 cited

The impact of wind mass loss on nucleosynthesis and yields of very massive stars at low metallicity

Erin R. Higgins, Jorick S. Vink, Raphael Hirschi +2

The chemical feedback from stellar winds in low metallicity (Z) environments is key for understanding the evolution of globular clusters and the early Universe. With disproportiona…

astro-ph.SR2025

The black hole - pair instability boundary for high stellar rotation

Ethan R. J. Winch, Gautham N. Sabhahit, Jorick S. Vink +1

The Pair Instability (PI) boundary is crucial for understanding heavy merging Black Holes (BHs) and the second mass gap's role in galactic chemical evolution. So far, no works have…

astro-ph.SR2025

Coupling hydrodynamics with comoving frame radiative transfer. III. The wind regime of early-type B hypergiants

M. Bernini-Peron, A. A. C. Sander, F. Najarro +8

Context. B hypergiants (BHGs) are important for understanding high-mass stellar evolution. While they are in a similar parameter space of B supergiants (BSGs), some BHGs are known…

astro-ph.SR2025

A new mass estimate method with hydrodynamical atmospheres for very massive WNh stars

Gautham N. Sabhahit, Jorick S. Vink, Andreas A. C. Sander +4

Very massive stars with masses over 100 Msun are key objects in the Universe for our understanding of chemical and energetic feedback in the Universe, but their evolution and fate…

astro-ph.SR2024

Stellar Expansion or Inflation?

Gautham N. Sabhahit, Jorick S. Vink

While stellar expansion after core-hydrogen exhaustion related to thermal imbalance has been documented for decades, the physical phenomenon of stellar inflation that occurs close…

astro-ph.SR2024★ 11 cited

The Maximum Black Hole Mass at Solar Metallicity

Jorick S. Vink, Gautham N. Sabhahit, Erin R. Higgins

We analyse the current knowledge and uncertainties in detailed stellar evolution and wind modelling to evaluate the mass of the most massive stellar black hole (BH) at solar metall…

astro-ph.HE2024★ 1 cited

Predicting the Heaviest Black Holes below the Pair Instability Gap

Ethan R. J. Winch, Jorick S. Vink, Erin R. Higgins +1

Traditionally, the pair instability (PI) mass gap is located between 50\,and 130\,, with stellar mass black holes (BHs) expected to "pile up" towards the lower PI edge.…

astro-ph.SR2023

Modelling time-dependent convective penetration in 1D stellar evolution

Cole Johnston, Mathias Michielsen, Evan H. Anders +7

1D stellar evolution calculations produce uncertain predictions for quantities like the age, core mass, core compactness, and nucleo-synthetic yields; a key source of uncertainty i…

astro-ph.SR2023★ 4 cited

Stellar Wind Yields of Very Massive Stars

Erin R. Higgins, Jorick S. Vink, Raphael Hirschi +2

The most massive stars provide an essential source of recycled material for young clusters and galaxies. While very massive stars (VMS, M>100M) are relatively rare compared to O st…

astro-ph.SR2023★ 46 cited

Very Massive Stars and Pair-Instability Supernovae: Mass-loss Framework for low Metallicity

Gautham N. Sabhahit, Jorick S. Vink, Andreas A. C. Sander +1

Very massive stars (VMS) up to 200-300 have been found in the Local Universe. If they would lose little mass they produce intermediate-mass black holes or pair-instabilit…

astro-ph.SR2023★ 61 cited

X-Shooting ULLYSES: massive stars at low metallicity. I. Project Description

Jorick S. Vink, A. Mehner, P. A. Crowther +78

Observations of individual massive stars, super-luminous supernovae, gamma-ray bursts, and gravitational-wave events involving spectacular black-hole mergers, indicate that the low…

astro-ph.SR2023★ 10 cited

Bringing Stellar Evolution & Feedback Together: Summary of proposals from the Lorentz Center Workshop, 2022

Sam Geen, Poojan Agrawal, Paul A. Crowther +34

Stars strongly impact their environment, and shape structures on all scales throughout the universe, in a process known as ``feedback''. Due to the complexity of both stellar evolu…

astro-ph.SR2023★ 46 cited

The temperature dependency of Wolf-Rayet-type mass loss: An exploratory study for winds launched by the hot iron bump

A. A. C. Sander, R. R. Lefever, L. G. Poniatowski +3

CONTEXT: The mass loss of He-burning stars, which are partially or completely stripped of their outer hydrogen envelope, is a catalyst of the cosmic matter cycle and decisive ingre…

astro-ph.SR2022★ 13 cited

The hydrogen clock to infer the upper stellar mass

Erin R. Higgins, Jorick S. Vink, Gautham N. Sabhahit +1

The most massive stars dominate the chemical enrichment, mechanical and radiative feedback, and energy budget of their host environments. Yet how massive stars initially form and h…

astro-ph.SR2022

Mass-loss implementation and temperature evolution of very massive stars

Gautham N. Sabhahit, Jorick S. Vink, Erin R. Higgins +1

Very massive stars (VMS) dominate the physics of young clusters due to their ionising radiation and extreme stellar winds. It is these winds that determine their lifepaths until ex…