scholarly journals Brownian motion of supermassive black holes in galaxy cores

2019 ◽  
Vol 14 (S351) ◽  
pp. 93-96 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pierfrancesco Di Cintio ◽  
Luca Ciotti ◽  
Carlo Nipoti

AbstractWe investigate the dynamics of supermassive black holes (SMBHs) in galactic cores by means of a semi-analytic model based on the Langevin equation, including dynamical friction and stochastic noise accounting for the gravitational interactions with stars. The model is validated against direct N-body simulations of intermediate-mass black holes in stellar clusters where a realistic number of particles is accessible. For the galactic case, we find that the SMBH experiences a Brownian-like motion with a typical displacement from the geometric center of the Galaxy of a few parsecs, for system parameters compatible with M87.

2021 ◽  
Vol 502 (2) ◽  
pp. 2682-2700
Author(s):  
Abbas Askar ◽  
Melvyn B Davies ◽  
Ross P Church

ABSTRACT Supermassive black holes (SMBHs) are found in most galactic nuclei. A significant fraction of these nuclei also contains a nuclear stellar cluster (NSC) surrounding the SMBH. In this paper, we consider the idea that the NSC forms first, from the merger of several stellar clusters that may contain intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs). These IMBHs can subsequently grow in the NSC and form an SMBH. We carry out N-body simulations of the simultaneous merger of three stellar clusters to form an NSC, and investigate the outcome of simulated runs containing zero, one, two, and three IMBHs. We find that IMBHs can efficiently sink to the centre of the merged cluster. If multiple merging clusters contain an IMBH, we find that an IMBH binary is likely to form and subsequently merge by gravitational wave emission. We show that these mergers are catalyzed by dynamical interactions with surrounding stars, which systematically harden the binary and increase its orbital eccentricity. The seed SMBH will be ejected from the NSC by the recoil kick produced when two IMBHs merge, if their mass ratio q ≳ 0.15. If the seed is ejected then no SMBH will form in the NSC. This is a natural pathway to explain those galactic nuclei that contain an NSC but apparently lack an SMBH, such as M33. However, if an IMBH is retained then it can seed the growth of an SMBH through gas accretion and tidal disruption of stars.


2020 ◽  
Vol 500 (4) ◽  
pp. 4639-4657 ◽  
Author(s):  
Deaglan J Bartlett ◽  
Harry Desmond ◽  
Julien Devriendt ◽  
Pedro G Ferreira ◽  
Adrianne Slyz

ABSTRACT We study the displacements between the centres of galaxies and their supermassive black holes (BHs) in the cosmological hydrodynamical simulation Horizon-AGN, and in a variety of observations from the literature. The BHs in Horizon-AGN feel a subgrid dynamical friction force, sourced by the surrounding gas, which prevents recoiling BHs being ejected from the galaxy. We find that (i) the fraction of spatially offset BHs increases with cosmic time, (ii) BHs live on prograde orbits in the plane of the galaxy with an orbital radius that decays with time but stalls near z = 0, and (iii) the magnitudes of offsets from the galaxy centres are substantially larger in the simulation than in observations. We attribute the stalling of the infall and excessive offset magnitudes to the fact that dynamical friction from stars and dark matter is not modelled in the simulation, and hence provide a way to improve the BH dynamics of future simulations.


2014 ◽  
Vol 2014 ◽  
pp. 1-8 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Sivaram ◽  
Kenath Arun

There is a lot of current astrophysical evidence and interest in intermediate mass black holes (IMBH), ranging from a few hundred to several thousand solar masses. The active galaxy M82 and the globular cluster G1 in M31, for example, are known to host such objects. Here, we discuss several aspects of IMBH such as their expected luminosity, spectral nature of radiation, and associated jets. We also discuss possible scenarios for their formation including the effects of dynamical friction, and gravitational radiation. We also consider their formation in the early universe and also discuss the possibility of supermassive black holes forming from mergers of several IMBH and compare the relevant time scales involved with other scenarios.


2014 ◽  
Vol 10 (S312) ◽  
pp. 92-100
Author(s):  
Eugene Vasiliev

AbstractI review the evolution of binary supermassive black holes and focus on the stellar-dynamical mechanisms that may help to overcome the final-parsec problem – the possible stalling of the binary at a separation much larger than is required for an efficient gravitational wave emission. RecentN-body simulations have suggested that a departure from spherical symmetry in the nucleus of the galaxy may keep the rate of interaction of stars with the binary at a high enough level so that the binary continues to shrink rather rapidly. However, a major problem of all these simulations is that they do not probe the regime where collisionless effects are dominant – in other words, the number of particles in the simulation is still not sufficient to reach the asymptotic behavior of the system. I present a novel Monte Carlo method for simulating both collisional and collisionless evolution of non-spherical stellar systems, and apply it for the problem of binary supermassive black hole evolution. I show that in triaxial galaxies the final-parsec problem is largely non-existent, while in the axisymmetric case it seems to still exist in the limit of purely collisionless regime relevant for real galaxies, but disappears in theN-body simulations where the feasible values ofNare still too low to get rid of collisional effects.


2019 ◽  
Vol 14 (S351) ◽  
pp. 80-83 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melvyn B. Davies ◽  
Abbas Askar ◽  
Ross P. Church

AbstractSupermassive black holes are found in most galactic nuclei. A large fraction of these nuclei also contain a nuclear stellar cluster surrounding the black hole. Here we consider the idea that the nuclear stellar cluster formed first and that the supermassive black hole grew later. In particular we consider the merger of three stellar clusters to form a nuclear stellar cluster, where some of these clusters contain a single intermediate-mass black hole (IMBH). In the cases where multiple clusters contain IMBHs, we discuss whether the black holes are likely to merge and whether such mergers are likely to result in the ejection of the merged black hole from the nuclear stellar cluster. In some cases, no supermassive black hole will form as any merger product is not retained. This is a natural pathway to explain those galactic nuclei that contain a nuclear stellar cluster but apparently lack a supermassive black hole; M33 being a nearby example. Alternatively, if an IMBH merger product is retained within the nuclear stellar cluster, it may subsequently grow, e.g. via the tidal disruption of stars, to form a supermassive black hole.


2008 ◽  
Vol 678 (2) ◽  
pp. 780-797 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alessia Gualandris ◽  
David Merritt

Author(s):  
Takuma Izumi ◽  
Masafusa Onoue ◽  
Yoshiki Matsuoka ◽  
Tohru Nagao ◽  
Michael A Strauss ◽  
...  

Abstract We present ALMA [C ii] line and far-infrared (FIR) continuum observations of three $z \gt 6$ low-luminosity quasars ($M_{\rm 1450} \gt -25$ mag) discovered by our Subaru Hyper Suprime-Cam (HSC) survey. The [C ii] line was detected in all three targets with luminosities of $(2.4\mbox{--}9.5) \times 10^8\, L_{\odot }$, about one order of magnitude smaller than optically luminous ($M_{\rm 1450} \lesssim -25$ mag) quasars. The FIR continuum luminosities range from $\lt 9 \times 10^{10}\, L_{\odot }$ (3 $\sigma$ limit) to ${\sim } 2 \times 10^{12}\, L_{\odot }$, indicating a wide range in star formation rates in these galaxies. Most of the HSC quasars studied thus far show [C ii]/ FIR luminosity ratios similar to local star-forming galaxies. Using the [C ii]-based dynamical mass ($M_{\rm dyn}$) as a surrogate for bulge stellar mass ($M_{\rm\, bulge}$), we find that a significant fraction of low-luminosity quasars are located on or even below the local $M_{\rm\, BH}$–$M_{\rm\, bulge}$ relation, particularly at the massive end of the galaxy mass distribution. In contrast, previous studies of optically luminous quasars have found that black holes are overmassive relative to the local relation. Given the low luminosities of our targets, we are exploring the nature of the early co-evolution of supermassive black holes and their hosts in a less biased way. Almost all of the quasars presented in this work are growing their black hole mass at a much higher pace at $z \sim 6$ than the parallel growth model, in which supermassive black holes and their hosts grow simultaneously to match the local $M_{\rm\, BH}$–$M_{\rm\, bulge}$ relation at all redshifts. As the low-luminosity quasars appear to realize the local co-evolutionary relation even at $z \sim 6$, they should have experienced vigorous starbursts prior to the currently observed quasar phase to catch up with the relation.


2013 ◽  
Vol 53 (A) ◽  
pp. 665-670
Author(s):  
Janusz Ziółkowski

In this review, I will briefly discuss the different types of black hole (BH) populations (supermassive, intermediate mass and stellar mass BHs) both in the Galaxy and in the Magellanic Clouds and compare them with each other.


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