by Shankar, F. and Marulli, F. and Mathur, S. and Bernardi, M. and Bournaud, F.
9 pages, 4 Figures. Accepted by A&A

There is mounting evidence that a significant fraction of Black Holes (BHs) today live in late-type galaxies, including bulge-less galaxies and those hosting pseudobulges, and are significantly undermassive with respect to the scaling relations followed by their counterpart BHs in classical bulges of similar stellar (or even bulge) mass. Here we discuss the predictions of two state-of-the-art hierarchical galaxy formation models in which BHs grow via mergers and, in one, also via disk instability. Our aim is to understand if the wealth of new data on local BH demography is consistent with standard models. We follow the merger trees of representative subsamples of BHs and compute the fractional contributions of different processes to the final BH mass. We show that the model in which BHs always closely follow the growth of their host bulges, also during late disk instabilities (i.e., bars), produces too narrow a distribution of BHs at fixed stellar mass to account for the numerous low-mass BHs now detected in later-type galaxies. Models with a looser connection between BH growth and bar instability instead predict the existence of a larger number of undermassive BHs, in better agreement with the observations. The scatter in the updated local BH-bulge mass relation (with no restriction on galaxy type) appears to be quite large when including later-type systems, but it can still be managed to be reproduced within current hierarchical models. However, the fuelling of BHs during the late bar-instability mode needs to be better quantified/improved to properly fit the data. We conclude discussing how the possibly large number of BHs in later type galaxies demands for an in-depth revision of the local BH mass function and its modelling.

by Sopuerta, Carlos F. and Yunes, Nicolas
10 pages, 3 figures. LaTeX, JPCS style. Submitted to the proceedings of the 9th Edoardo Amaldi Conference on Gravitational Waves, and the 2011 Numerical Relativity – Data Analysis (NRDA) meeting, held 10-15 July 2011 in Cardiff, Wales, UK, July 10-15 2011

We describe a new kludge scheme to model the dynamics of generic extreme-mass-ratio inspirals (EMRIs; stellar compact objects spiraling into a spinning supermassive black hole) and their gravitational-wave emission. The Chimera scheme is a hybrid method that combines tools from different approximation techniques in General Relativity: (i) A multipolar, post-Minkowskian expansion for the far-zone metric perturbation (the gravitational waveforms) and for the local prescription of the self-force; (ii) a post-Newtonian expansion for the computation of the multipole moments in terms of the trajectories; and (iii) a BH perturbation theory expansion when treating the trajectories as a sequence of self-adjusting Kerr geodesics. The EMRI trajectory is made out of Kerr geodesic fragments joined via the method of osculating elements as dictated by the multipolar post-Minkowskian radiation-reaction prescription. We implemented the proper coordinate mapping between Boyer-Lindquist coordinates, associated with the Kerr geodesics, and harmonic coordinates, associated with the multipolar post-Minkowskian decomposition. The Chimera scheme is thus a combination of approximations that can be used to model generic inspirals of systems with extreme to intermediate mass ratios, and hence, it can provide valuable information for future space-based gravitational-wave observatories, like LISA, and even for advanced ground detectors. The local character in time of our multipolar post-Minkowskian self-force makes this scheme amenable to study the possible appearance of transient resonances in generic inspirals.

by Barausse, Enrico
25 pages, 15 figures

[Abridged] [...] In this paper, we study the mass and spin evolution of massive black holes within a semianalytical galaxy-formation model that follows the evolution of dark-matter halos along merger trees, as well as that of the baryonic components (hot gas, stellar and gaseous bulges, and stellar and gaseous galactic disks). This allows us to study the mass and spin evolution of massive black holes in a self-consistent way, by taking into account the effect of the gas present in galactic nuclei both during the accretion phases and during mergers. Also, we present predictions, as a function of redshift, for the fraction of gas-rich black-hole mergers — in which the spins prior to the merger are aligned due to the gravito-magnetic torques exerted by the circumbinary disk — as opposed to gas-poor mergers, in which the orientation of the spins before the merger is roughly isotropic. These predictions may be tested by LISA or similar spaced-based gravitational-wave detectors such as eLISA/NGO or SGO.

by Anders, P. and Baumgardt, H. and Gaburov, E. and Zwart, S. Portegies
14 pages incl. 3 pages with figures and 4 pages of tables (analysis results), MNRAS in press

Most recent progress in understanding the dynamical evolution of star clusters relies on direct N-body simulations. Owing to the computational demands, and the desire to model more complex and more massive star clusters, hardware calculational accelerators, such as GRAPE special-purpose hardware or, more recently, GPUs (i.e. graphics cards), are generally utilised. In addition, simulations can be accelerated by adjusting parameters determining the calculation accuracy (i.e. changing the internal simulation time step used for each star).

We extend our previous thorough comparison (Anders et al. 2009) of basic quantities as derived from simulations performed either with STARLAB/KIRA or NBODY6. Here we focus on differences arising from using different hardware accelerations (including the increasingly popular graphic card accelerations/GPUs) and different calculation accuracy settings.

We use the large number of star cluster models (for a fixed stellar mass function, without stellar/binary evolution, primordial binaries, external tidal fields etc) already used in the previous paper, evolve them with STARLAB/KIRA (and NBODY6, where required), analyse them in a consistent way and compare the averaged results quantitatively. For this quantitative comparison, we apply the bootstrap algorithm for functional dependencies developed in our previous study.

In general we find very high comparability of the simulation results, independent of the used computer hardware (including the hardware accelerators) and the used N-body code. For the tested accuracy settings we find that for reduced accuracy (i.e. time step at least a factor 2.5 larger than the standard setting) most simulation results deviate significantly from the results using standard settings. The remaining deviations are comprehensible and explicable.

by Devecchi, B. and Volonteri, M. and Rossi, E. M. and Colpi, M. and Zwart, S. Portegies
12 pages, MNRAS, accepted

We present results of simulations aimed at tracing the formation of nuclear star clusters (NCs) and black hole (BH) seeds, in a cosmological context. We focus on two mechanisms for the formation of BHs at high redshifts: as end-products of (1) Population III stars in metal free halos, and of (2) runaway stellar collisions in metal poor NCs. Our model tracks the chemical, radiative and mechanical feedback of stars on the baryonic component of the evolving halos. This procedure allows us to evaluate when and where the conditions for BH formation are met, and to trace the emergence of BH seeds arising from the dynamical channel, in a cosmological context. BHs start to appear already at z~30 as remnants of Population III stars. The efficiency of this mechanism begins decreasing once feedbacks become increasingly important. Around redshift z~15, BHs mostly form in the centre of mildly metal enriched halos inside dense NCs. The seed BHs that form along the two pathways have at birth a mass around 100-1000M\odot. The occupation fraction of BHs is a function of both halo mass and mass growth rate: at a given z, heavier and faster growing halos have a higher chance to form a native BH, or to acquire an inherited BH via merging of another system. With decreasing z, the probability of finding a BH shifts toward progressively higher mass halo intervals. This is due to the fact that, at later cosmic times, low mass systems rarely form a seed, and already formed BHs are deposited into larger mass systems due to hierarchical mergers. Our model predict that at z=0, all halos above 10^11M\odot should host a BH (in agreement with observational results), most probably inherited during their lifetime. Halos less massive then 10^9M\odot have a higher probability to host a native BH, but their occupation fraction decreases below 10%.

by Hayasaki, Kimitake and Yagi, Kent and Tanaka, Takahiro and Mineshige, Shin
10 pages, 2 figures, submitted to ApJ

When binary black holes are embedded in a gaseous environment, a rotating disk surrounding them, the so-called circumbinary disk, will be formed. The binary exerts a gravitational torque on the circumbinary disk and thereby the orbital angular momentum is transferred to it, while the angular momentum of the circumbinary disk is transferred to the binary through the mass accretion. The binary undergoes an orbital decay due to both the gravitational wave emission and the binary-disk interaction. This causes the phase evolution of the gravitational wave signal. The precise measurement of the gravitational wave phase thus may provide information regarding the circumbinary disk. In this paper, we assess the detectability of the signature of the binary-disk interaction using the future space-borne gravitational wave detectors such as DECIGO and BBO by the standard matched filtering analysis. We find that the effect of the circumbinary disk around binary black holes in the mass range $latex 6M_sun\le{M}\lesssim3\times10^3M_sun$ is detectable at a statistically significant level in five year observation, provided that gas accretes onto the binary at a rate greater than $latex \dot{M}\sim1.4\times10^{17} [gs^{-1}] j^{-1}(M/10M_sun)^{33/23}$ with 10% mass-to-energy conversion efficiency, where j represents the efficiency of the angular momentum transfer from the binary to the circumbinary disk. We show that $latex O(0.1)$ coalescence events are expected to occur in sufficiently dense molecular clouds in five year observation. We also point out that the circumbinary disk is detectable, even if its mass at around the inner edge is by over 10 orders of magnitude less than the binary mass.

by Blecha, Laura and Loeb, Abraham and Narayan, Ramesh
20 pages, 9 figures. Submitted to MNRAS

We present a first attempt to model the narrow-line (NL) region of active galactic nuclei (AGN) in hydrodynamic simulations of galaxy mergers, using a novel physical prescription. This model is used to determine the origin of double-peaked NL (dNL) AGN in merging galaxies and their connection to supermassive black hole (SMBH) pairs, motivated by recent observations of such objects. We find that dNL AGN induced by the relative motion of SMBH pairs are a generic but short-lived feature of gaseous major mergers. dNL AGN are most likely to be observed in late-stage mergers, during the kpc-scale phase of SMBH inspiral or soon after the SMBH merger. However, even within the kpc-scale phase, only a minority of dNL AGN are directly induced by SMBH motion; their lifetimes are typically a few Myr. Most double peaks arise from gas kinematics near the SMBH, although prior to the SMBH merger up to 80% of all dNL profiles may be influenced by SMBH motion via altered peak ratios or velocity offsets. The total lifetimes of dNL AGN depend strongly on viewing angle and on properties of the merging galaxies. Also, in a typical merger, at least 10-40% of the double peaks induced by SMBH motion have small projected separations, 0.1-1 kpc, such that dual peaks of stellar surface brightness are not easily resolved. Diffuse tidal features can indicate late-stage galaxy mergers, although they do not distinguish SMBH pairs from merged SMBHs. We show that dNL profiles with peak velocity splittings > 500 km s^-1 or with measurable overall velocity shifts are often associated with SMBH pairs. Our results support the notion that selection of dNL AGN is a promising method for identifying dual SMBH candidates, but demonstrate the critical importance of high-resolution, multi-wavelength follow-up observations, and the use of multiple lines of evidence, for confirming the dual nature of candidate SMBH pairs. (Abridged)

by O’Shaughnessy, R. and Healy, J. and London, L. and Meeks, Z. and Shoemaker, D.
Submitted to PRD

The gravitational wave signature emitted from a merging binary depends on the orientation of an observer relative to the binary. Previous studies suggest that emission along the total initial or total final angular momenta leads to both the strongest and simplest signal from a precessing compact binary. In this paper we describe a concrete counterexample: a binary with $latex m_1/m_2=4$, $latex a_1=0.6 \hat{x} = -a_2$, placed in orbit in the x,y plane. We extract the gravitational wave emission along several proposed emission directions, including the initial (Newtonian) orbital angular momentum; the final (~ initial) total angular momentum; and the dominant principal axis of $latex _M$. Using several diagnostics, we show that the suggested preferred directions are not representative. For example, only for a handful of other directions (0.95). We conclude that the information available in just one direction (or mode) does not adequately encode the complexity of orientation-dependent emission for even short signals from merging black hole binaries. Future investigations of precessing, unequal-mass binaries should carefully explore and model their orientation-dependent emission.

by Lousto, Carlos O. and Zlochower, Yosef and Dotti, Massimo and Volonteri, Marta
17 pages, 10 tables, 14 figures, revtex 4

We explore the newly discovered “hangup-kick” effect, which greatly amplifies the recoil for configuration with partial spin- orbital-angular momentum alignment, by studying a set of 48 new simulations of equal-mass, spinning black-hole binaries. We propose a phenomenological model for the recoil that takes this new effect into account and then use this model, in conjunction with statistical distributions for the spin magnitude and orientations, based on accretion simulations, to find the probabilities for observing recoils of several thousand km/s. In addition, we provide initial parameters, eccentricities, radiated linear and angular momentum, precession rates and remnant mass, spin, and recoils for all 48 configurations. Our results indicate that surveys exploring peculiar (redshifted or blueshifted) differential line-of-sight velocities should observe at least one case above 2000 km/s out of four thousand merged galaxies. The probability that a remnant BH receives a total recoil exceeding the ~2000 km/s escape velocity of large elliptical galaxies is ten times larger. Probabilities of recoils exceeding the escape velocity quickly rise to 5% for galaxies with escape velocities of 1000 km/s and nearly 20% for galaxies with escape velocities of 500 km/s. In addition the direction of these large recoils is strongly peaked toward the angular momentum axis, with very low probabilities of recoils exceeding 350 km/s for angles larger than 45 deg. with respect to the orbital angular momentum axis.

by Zubovas, Kastytis and King, Andrew R.
6 pages, 1 figure, 2 tables; accepted for publication in ApJ Letters

It is widely suspected that AGN activity ultimately sweeps galaxies clear of their gas. We work out the observable properties required to achieve this. Large-scale AGN-driven outflows should have kinetic luminosities $latex \sim \eta\le/2 \sim 0.05\le$ and momentum rates $latex \sim 20\le/c$, where $latex \le$ is the Eddington luminosity of the central black hole and $latex \eta\sim 0.1$ its radiative accretion efficiency. This creates an expanding two-phase medium in which molecular species coexist with hot gas, which can persist after the central AGN has switched off. This picture predicts outflow velocities $latex \sim 1000 – 1500$ km\,s$latex ^{-1}$ and mass outflow rates up to $latex 4000 \msun\,{\rm yr}^{-1}$ on kpc scales, fixed mainly by the host galaxy velocity dispersion (or equivalently black hole mass). All these features agree with those of outflows observed in galaxies such as Mrk231. This strongly suggests that AGN activity is what sweeps galaxies clear of their gas on a dynamical timescale and makes them red and dead. We suggest future observational tests of this picture.

by Johannsen, Tim and Psaltis, Dimitrios and Gillessen, Stefan and Marrone, Daniel P. and Ozel, Feryal and Doeleman, Sheperd S. and Fish, Vincent L.
7 pages, 4 figures, 2 tables, submitted to ApJ

Dynamical mass measurements to date have allowed determinations of the mass M and the distance D of the galactic center black hole Sgr A* as well as those of other nearby supermassive black holes. In the case of Sgr A*, these measurements are limited by a degeneracy between the mass and distance scaling roughly as M ~ D^2. Future very-long baseline interferometric observations will image a bright and narrow ring surrounding the shadow of the supermassive black hole, if its accretion flow is optically thin. In this paper, we show that the combination of dynamical measurements and VLBI imaging of the ring of Sgr A* breaks the degeneracy between mass and distance. We estimate the signal to noise ratio of near-future VLBI arrays consisting of five to six stations and simulate measurements of the mass and distance of Sgr A* using the expected size of the ring image and existing data of stellar ephemerides. We demonstrate that VLBI observations at 1 mm can already improve the error on the mass by a factor of three compared to the results from the monitoring of stellar orbits alone; observations at 0.5 mm can reduce the error by as much as a factor of 7.5. In addition, we calculate the angular sizes of the bright rings of a number of other nearby supermassive black holes and identify the optimal targets besides Sgr A* that could be imaged by a ground-based VLBI array or a future space-VLBI mission allowing for refined mass measurements.

by Binétruy, Pierre and Bohé, Alejandro and Caprini, Chiara and Dufaux, Jean-François
46 pages, 12 figures

We review the main cosmological backgrounds of gravitational waves accessible to detectors in space sensitive to the range $latex 10^{-4}$ to $latex 10^{-1}$ Hz, with a special emphasis on those backgrounds due to phase transitions or networks of cosmic strings. We apply this to identify the scientific potential of the NGO/eLISA mission of ESA, regarding the detectability of such cosmological backgrounds.

by Barai, Paramita and Proga, Daniel and Nagamine, Kentaro
23 pages, 11 figures, submitted. Uploaded version contains low-resolution color figures. Version with high-resolution figures can be found at: http://www.physics.unlv.edu/~barai/AllPages/Images-Movies/BHaccr_MultiPhase.pdf

(Abridged) We investigate non-spherical behavior of gas accreting onto a central supermassive black hole performing simulations using the SPH code GADGET-3 including radiative cooling and heating by the central X-ray source. As found in earlier 1D studies, our 3D simulations show that the accretion mode depends on the X-ray luminosity (L_X) for a fixed density at infinity and accretion efficiency. In the low L_X limit, gas accretes in a stable, spherically symmetric fashion. In the high L_X limit, the inner gas is significantly heated up and expands, reducing the central mass inflow rate. The expanding gas can turn into a strong enough outflow capable of expelling most of the gas at larger radii. For some intermediate L_X, the accretion flow becomes unstable developing prominent non-spherical features, the key reason for which is thermal instability (TI) as shown by our analyses. Small perturbations of the initially spherically symmetric accretion flow that is heated by the intermediate L_X quickly grow to form cold and dense clumps surrounded by overheated low density regions. The cold clumps continue their inward motion forming filamentary structures; while the hot infalling gas slows down because of buoyancy and can even start outflowing through the channels in between the filaments. We found that the ratio between the mass inflow rates of the cold and hot gas is a dynamical quantity depending on several factors: time, spatial location, and L_X; and ranges between 0 and 4. We briefly discuss astrophysical implications of such TI-driven fragmentation of accreting gas on the formation of clouds in narrow and broad line regions of AGN, the formation of stars, and the observed variability of the AGN luminiosity.

by Mozaffari, Ali
9 Pages, 5 Figures

In previous work, it was been shown that MOdified Newtonian Dynamics (MOND) can be tested near the saddle points of the Newtonian gravitational potential using the forthcoming LISA Pathfinder mission. All previous analysis focused on one particular formulation of the MO-Dian theory, here dubbed Type I. We show that in addition to the well known AQUAL formulation (which we dub Type III), another possibility exists in the form of a driven Poisson equation for the MONDian field. We look at similar quantitative and qualitative analysis in this theory and also investigate typical Signal to Noise Ratios (SNR) resulting from these theories for a typical LPF test. We show that a typical 50 km fly-by would amplify the SNR from 28 to 35 between the two theories. We also suggest that SNR will be enhanced for impact parameters as large as 1000km or larger. Null constraints however remain as good but no better in this formulation than any other.

by Agudo, Ivan and Marscher, Alan P. and Jorstad, Svetlana G. and Gomez, Jose L. and Perucho, Manel and Piner, B. Glenn and Rioja, Maria and Dodson, Richard
Accepted for Publication in The Astrophysical Journal. 11 pages, 6 figures, 4 tables. High resolution images on figure 1 and complete tables 1 and 2 may be provided on request

We present the results from an ultra-high-resolution 7mm Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) study of the relativistic jet in the BL Lacertae object OJ287 from 1995 to 2011 containing 136 total intensity images. Analysis of the image sequence reveals a sharp jet-position-angle swing by >100 deg. during [2004,2006], as viewed in the plane of the sky, that we interpret as the crossing of the jet from one side of the line of sight to the other during a softer and longer term swing of the inner jet. Modulating such long term swing, our images also show for the first time a prominent erratic wobbling behavior of the innermost ~0.4mas of the jet with fluctuations in position angle of up to ~40 deg. over time scales ~2yr. This is accompanied by highly superluminal motions along non-radial trajectories, which reflect the remarkable non-ballistic nature of the jet plasma on these scales. The erratic nature and short time scales of the observed behavior rules out scenarios such as binary black hole systems, accretion disk precession, and interaction with the ambient medium as possible origins of the phenomenon on the scales probed by our observations, although such processes may cause longer-term modulation of the jet direction. We propose that variable asymmetric injection of the jet flow; perhaps related to turbulence in the accretion disk; coupled with hydrodynamic instabilities, leads to the non-ballistic dynamics that cause the observed non-periodic changes in the direction of the inner jet.

by Healy, James and Bode, Tanja and Haas, Roland and Pazos, Enrique and Laguna, Pablo and Shoemaker, Deirdre M. and Yunes, Nicolás
4 pages, 5 figures, 1 table

Gravitational wave observations will probe non-linear gravitational interactions and thus enable strong tests of Einstein’s theory of general relativity. We present a numerical relativity study of the late inspiral and merger of binary black holes in scalar-tensor theories of gravity. We consider black hole binaries in an inhomogeneous scalar field, specifically binaries inside a scalar field bubble, in some cases with a potential. We calculate the emission of dipole radiation. We also show how these configurations trigger detectable differences between gravitational waves in scalar-tensor gravity and the corresponding waves in general relativity. We conclude that, barring an external mechanism to induce dynamics in the scalar field, scalar-tensor gravity binary black holes alone are not capable of awaking a dormant scalar field, and are thus observationally indistinguishable from their general relativistic counterparts.

by Constantin, Anca and Seth, Anil
11 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in Advances in Astronomy

We discuss the peculiar nature of the nucleus of M94 (NGC 4736) in the context of new measurements of the broad H_alpha emission from HST-STIS observations. We show that this component is unambiguously associated with the high-resolution X-ray, radio, and variable UV sources detected at the optical nucleus of this galaxy. These multi-wavelength observations suggest that NGC 4736 is one of the least luminous broad-line (type 1) LINERs, with Lbol = 2.5 \times 10^40 erg/s. This LINER galaxy has also possibly the least luminous broad line region known (LH_alpha =2.2\times10^37 erg/s). We compare black hole mass estimates of this system to the recently measured ~7 \times 10^6 M_sun dynamical black hole mass measurement. The fundamental plane and M-sigma relationship roughly agree with the measured black hole mass, while other accretion based estimates (the M-FWHM(H_alpha) relation, empirical correlation of BH mass with high-ionization mid IR emission lines, and the X-ray excess variance) provide much lower estimates (~10^5 M_sun). An energy budget test shows that the AGN in this system may be deficient in ionizing radiation relative to the observed emission-line activity. This deficiency may result from source variability or the superposition of multiple sources including supernovae.

by Dubois, Yohan and Pichon, Christophe and Haehnelt, Martin and Kimm, Taysun and Slyz, Adrianne and Devriendt, Julien and Pogosyan, Dmitry
16 pages, 12 figures, submitted to MNRAS

We use cosmological hydrodynamical simulations to show that a significant fraction of the gas in high redshift rare massive halos falls nearly radially to their very centre on extremely short timescales. This process results in the formation of very compact bulges with specific angular momentum a factor 5-30$latex smaller than the average angular momentum of the baryons in the whole halo. Such low angular momentum originates both from segregation and effective cancellation when the gas flows to the centre of the halo along well defined cold filamentary streams. These filaments penetrate deep inside the halo and connect to the bulge from multiple rapidly changing directions. Structures falling in along the filaments (satellite galaxies) or formed by gravitational instabilities triggered by the inflow (star clusters) further reduce the angular momentum of the gas in the bulge. Finally, the fraction of gas radially falling to the centre appears to increase with the mass of the halo; we argue that this is most likely due to an enhanced cancellation of angular momentum in rarer halos which are fed by more isotropically distributed cold streams. Such an increasingly efficient funnelling of low-angular momentum gas to the centre of very massive halos at high redshift may account for the rapid pace at which the most massive supermassive black holes grow to reach observed masses around $10^9$latex M$_\odot$ at an epoch when the Universe is barely 1 Gyr old.

by Erwin, Peter and Gadotti, Dimitri
pdflatex, 10 pages, 4 figures. Invited paper for Advances in Astronomy special issue: “Seeking for the Leading Actor on the Cosmic Stage: Galaxies versus Supermassive Black Holes”

Studies have suggested that there is a strong correlation between the masses of nuclear star clusters (NSCs) and their host galaxies, a correlation which said to be an extension of the well-known correlations between supermassive black holes (SMBHs) and their host galaxies. But careful analysis of disk galaxies — including 2D bulge/disk/bar decompositions — shows that while SMBHs correlate with the stellar mass of the bulge component of galaxies, the masses of NSCs correlate much better with the total galaxy stellar mass. In addition, the mass ratio M_nsc/M_star,tot for NSCs in spirals (at least those with Hubble types Sc and later) is typically an order of magnitude smaller than the mass ratio M_bh/M_star, bulge of SMBHs. The absence of a universal “central massive object” correlation argues against common formation and growth mechanisms for both SMBHs and NSCs. We also discuss evidence for a break in the NSC-host galaxy correlation: galaxies with Hubble types earlier than Sbc appear to host systematically more massive NSCs than do types Sc and later.

by Johnson, Jarrett L. and Whalen, Daniel J. and Fryer, Christopher L. and Li, Hui
14 pages, 4 figures; submitted to ApJ

The collapse of baryons into extremely massive stars with masses exceeding 10^4 M_Sun in a small fraction of protogalaxies at z > 10 is a promising candidate for the origin of supermassive black holes, some of which grow to a billion solar masses by z ~ 7. We determine the maximum masses such stars can attain by accreting primordial gas. We find that at relatively low accretion rates the strong ionizing radiation of these stars limits their masses to M_* ~ 10^3 M_Sun (dM_acc/dt / 10^-3 M_Sun yr^-1)^8/7, where dM_acc/dt is the rate at which the star gains mass. However, at the higher central infall rates usually found in numerical simulations of protogalactic collapse (>~ 0.1 M_Sun yr^-1), the lifetime of the star instead limits its final mass to >~ 10^6 M_Sun. Furthermore, for the spherical accretion rates at which the star can grow, its ionizing radiation is confined deep within the protogalaxy, so the evolution of the star is decoupled from that of its host galaxy. Lyman alpha emission from the surrounding H II region is trapped in these heavy accretion flows and likely reprocessed into strong Balmer series emission, which may be observable by the James Webb Space Telescope. This, along with strong He II 1640 Angstrom and continuum emission, are likely to be the key observational signatures of the progenitors of supermassive black holes at high redshift.

by Alexander, David M. and Hickox, Ryan C.
42 pages, 8 figures; Extensive review to appear in New Astronomy Reviews

Massive black holes (BHs) are at once exotic and yet ubiquitous, residing in the centers of massive galaxies in the local Universe. Recent years have seen remarkable advances in our understanding of how these BHs form and grow over cosmic time, during which they are revealed as active galactic nuclei (AGN). However, despite decades of research, we still lack a coherent picture of the physical drivers of BH growth, the connection between the growth of BHs and their host galaxies, the role of large-scale environment on the fueling of BHs, and the impact of BH-driven outflows on the growth of galaxies. In this paper we review our progress in addressing these key issues, motivated by the science presented at the “What Drives the Growth of Black Holes?” workshop held at Durham on 26th-29th July 2010, and discuss how these questions may be tackled with current and future facilities.

by Kelly, Brandon C. and Merloni, Andrea
40 pages, 7 figures, review paper accepted for the Advances in Astronomy Special Issue “Seeking for the Leading Actor on the Cosmic Stage: Galaxies versus Supermassive Black Holes”

The black hole mass function of supermassive black holes describes the evolution of the distribution of black hole mass. It is one of the primary empirical tools available for mapping the growth of supermassive black holes and for constraining theoretical models of their evolution. In this review we discuss methods for estimating the black hole mass function, including their advantages and disadvantages. We also review the results of using these methods for estimating the mass function of both active and inactive black holes. In addition, we review current theoretical models for the growth of supermassive black holes that predict the black hole mass function. We conclude with a discussion of directions for future research which will lead to improvement in both empirical and theoretical determinations of the mass function of supermassive black holes.

by Lauer, Tod R. and Bender, Ralf and Kormendy, John and Rosenfield, Philip and Green, Richard F.
29 pages, 11 figures (3 color); Astrophysical Journal accepted

We obtained U_330 and B band images of the M31 nucleus using the High Resolution Camera of the Advanced Camera for Surveys on board the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). The spatial resolution in the U_330-band, 0.03″ FWHM, or 0.1 pc at M31, is sufficient to resolve the outskirts of the compact cluster (P3) of UV-bright stars surrounding the M31 black hole. The center of the cluster is marked by an extended source that is both brighter and redder than the other point sources within P3; it is likely to be a blend of several bright stars. We hypothesize that it marks the location of the M31 black hole. Both stellar photometry and a surface brightness fluctuation analysis, show that the P3 stellar population is consistent with early-type main sequence stars formed in a ~100 – ~200 Myr old starburst population. Evolutionary tracks of post early asymptotic giant-branch stars, associated with late-stage evolution of an old population, also traverse the U and U-B domain occupied by the P3 stars; but we argue that only a few stars could be accounted for that way. PEAGB evolution is very rapid, and there is no progenitor population of red giants associated with P3. The result that P3 comprises young stars is consistent with inferences from earlier HST observations of the integrated light of the cluster. Like the Milky Way, M31 harbors a black hole closely surrounded by apparently young stars.

by Liu, F. K. and Wang, Dong and Chen, Xian
47 pages, 9 figures, 1 table; accepted for publication in ApJ

Numerical relativity simulations predict that coalescence of supermassive black hole (SMBH) binaries not only leads to a spin flip but also to a recoiling of the merger remnant SMBHs. In the literature, X-shaped radio sources are popularly suggested to be candidates for SMBH mergers with spin flip of jet-ejecting SMBHs. Here we investigate the spectral and spatial observational signatures of the recoiling SMBHs in radio sources undergoing black hole spin flip. Our results show that SMBHs in most spin-flip radio sources have mass ratio $latex q\ga 0.3$ with a minimum possible value $latex q_{\rm min} \simeq 0.05$. For major mergers, the remnant SMBHs can get a kick velocity as high as $latex 2100 km s^{-1}$ in the direction within an angle $latex \la 40^\circ$ relative to the spin axes of remnant SMBHs, implying that recoiling quasars are biased to be with high Doppler-shifted broad emission lines while recoiling radio galaxies are biased to large apparent spatial off-center displacements. We also calculate the distribution functions of line-of-sight velocity and apparent spatial off-center for spin-flip radio sources with different apparent jet reorientation angles. Our results show that the larger the apparent jet reorientation angle is, the larger the Doppler-shifting recoiling velocity and apparent spatial off-center displacement will be. We investigate the effects of recoiling velocity on the dust torus in spin-flip radio sources and suggest that recoiling of SMBHs would lead to “dust poor” AGNs. Finally, we collect a sample of 19 X-shaped radio objects and for each object give the probability of detecting the predicted signatures of recoiling SMBH.

by Lahav, Carmit Gordon and Meiron, Yohai and Soker, Noam
10 pages, 3 figures, 2 tables

We examine the scatter in the correlation between black hole masses and their host bulge masses, and find that the increase of the scatter with mass suggests that mergers alone cannot produce the observed correlation. A simple merger scenario of small galaxies leads to a proportionality relation between the late-time black hole and bulge masses, with intrinsic scatter increasing along the ridge line of the relation as the square root of the mass. By examining a sample of 87 galaxies, we find that the scatter increases with mass more rapidly than expected from the merger-only explanation. We do not dispute that mergers play a role, but our results favour a universal feedback mechanism that works on all scales. We discuss the possibility that the feedback mechanism that operated during galaxy formation involved the presence of a cooling flow.

by Treister, Ezequiel and Urry, C. Megan
33 pages, 20 figures, review paper accepted for the Advances in Astronomy Special Issue “Seeking for the Leading Actor on the Cosmic Stage: Galaxies versus Supermassive Black Holes”

Significant progress has been made in the last few years on understanding how supermassive black holes form and grow. In this paper, we begin by reviewing the spectral signatures of Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) ranging from radio to hard X-ray wavelengths. We then describe the most commonly used methods to find these sources, including optical/UV, radio, infrared and X-ray emission and optical emission lines. We then describe the main observational properties of the obscured and unobscured AGN population. Finally, we summarize the cosmic history of black hole accretion, i.e., when in the history of the Universe supermassive black holes were getting most of their mass. We finish with a summary of open questions and a description of planned and future observatories that are going to help answer them.

by Regimbau, Tania and Giampanis, Stefanos and Siemens, Xavier and Mandic, Vuk
21 pages, 11 figures, submitted to PRD

In the era of the next generation of gravitational wave experiments a stochastic background from cusps of cosmic (super)strings is expected to be probed and, if not detected, to be significantly constrained. A popcorn-like background can be, for part of the parameter space, as pronounced as the (Gaussian) continuous contribution from unresolved sources that overlap in frequency and time. We study both contributions from unresolved cosmic string cusps over a range of frequencies relevant to ground based interferometers, such as LIGO/Virgo second generation (AdLV) and Einstein Telescope (ET) third generation detectors, the space antenna LISA and Pulsar Timing Arrays (PTA). We compute the sensitivity (at $latex 2 \sigma$ level) in the parameter space for AdLV, ET, LISA and PTA. We conclude that the popcorn regime is complementary to the continuous background. Its detection could therefore enhance confidence in a stochastic background detection and possibly help determine fundamental string parameters such as the string tension and the reconnection probability.

by Schawinski, Kevin and Urry, Meg and Treister, Ezequiel and Simmons, Brooke and Natarajan, Priyamvada and Glikman, Eilat
Accepted for publication in ApJ Letters. 6 pages, 4 figures, 1 table

One of the key open questions in cosmology today pertains to understanding when, where and how super massive black holes form, while it is clear that mergers likely play a significant role in the growth cycles of black holes, how supermassive black holes form, and how galaxies grow around them. Here, we present Hubble Space Telescope WFC3/IR grism observations of a clumpy galaxy at z=1.35, with evidence for 10^6 – 10^7 Msun rapidly growing black holes in separate sub-components of the host galaxy. These black holes could have been brought into close proximity as a consequence of a rare multiple galaxy merger or they could have formed in situ. Such holes would eventually merge into a central black hole as the stellar clumps/components presumably coalesce to form a galaxy bulge. If we are witnessing the in-situ formation of multiple black holes, their properties can inform seed formation models and raise the possibility that massive black holes can continue to emerge in star-forming galaxies as late as z=1.35 (4.8 Gyr after the Big Bang).

by Jeon, Myoungwon and Pawlik, Andreas H. and Greif, Thomas H. and Glover, Simon C. O. and Bromm, Volker and Milosavljevic, Milos and Klessen, Ralf S.
17 pages, 14 figures

We study how the first galaxies were assembled under feedback from the accretion onto a central black hole (BH) that is left behind by the first generation of metal-free stars through self-consistent, cosmological simulations. X-ray radiation from the accretion of gas onto BH remnants of Population III (Pop III) stars, or from high-mass X-ray binaries (HMXBs), again involving Pop III stars, influences the mode of second generation star formation. We track the evolution of the black hole accretion rate and the associated X-ray feedback starting with the death of the Pop III progenitor star inside a minihalo and following the subsequent evolution of the black hole as the minihalo grows to become an atomically cooling galaxy. We find that X-ray photoionization heating from a stellar-mass BH is able to quench further star formation in the host halo at all times before the halo enters the atomic cooling phase. X-ray radiation from a HMXB, assuming a luminosity close to the Eddington value, exerts an even stronger, and more diverse, feedback on star formation. It photoheats the gas inside the host halo, but also promotes the formation of molecular hydrogen and cooling of gas in the intergalactic medium and in nearby minihalos, leading to a net increase in the number of stars formed at early times. Our simulations further show that the radiative feedback from the first BHs may strongly suppress early BH growth, thus constraining models for the formation of supermassive BHs.

by Barausse, Enrico and Buonanno, Alessandra and Tiec, Alexandre Le
11 pages, 2 figures

Using the main result of a companion paper, in which the binding energy of a circular-orbit non-spinning compact binary system is computed at leading-order beyond the test-particle approximation, the exact expression of the effective-one-body (EOB) metric component $latex g^\text{eff}_{tt}$ is obtained through first order in the mass ratio. Combining these results with the recent gravitational self-force calculation of the periastron advance for circular orbits in the Schwarzschild geometry, the EOB metric component $latex g^\text{eff}_{rr}$ is also determined at linear order in the mass ratio. These results assume that the mapping between the real and effective Hamiltonians at the second and third post-Newtonian (PN) orders holds at all PN orders. Our findings also confirm the advantage of resumming the PN dynamics around the test-particle limit if the goal is to obtain a flexible model that can smoothly connect the test-mass and equal-mass limits.

by Wyithe, Stuart and Loeb, Abraham
10 pages, 4 figures. Submitted to MNRAS

We identify a physical mechanism that would have resulted in rapid, obscured growth of seed super-massive black-holes in galaxies at z>6. Specifically, we find that the density at the centre of typical high redshift galaxies was at a level where the Bondi accretion rate implies a diffusion speed of photons that was slower than the gravitational infall velocity, resulting in photons being trapped within the accretion flow and advected into the black-hole. We show that there is a range of black-hole masses (M_bh ~ 10^3-10^5 solar masses) where the accretion flow traps radiation, corresponding to black-holes that were massive enough to generate a photon trapping accretion flow, but small enough that their Bondi radii did not exceed the isothermal scale height of self-gravitating gas. Under these conditions we find that the accretion reaches levels far in excess of the Eddington rate. A prediction of this scenario is that X-ray number counts of active galactic nuclei at z>6 would exhibit a cutoff at the low luminosities corresponding to black-hole masses below ~10^5 solar masses. At low redshifts we find photon trapping to be unimportant because it could only occur in rare low spin halos, and would require black-hole masses in excess of expectations from the observed black-hole – halo mass relation. The super-Eddington growth of ~10^5 solar mass seed black-holes at high redshift may have provided a natural acceleration towards the growth of super-massive black-holes at z~6-7, less than a billion years after the Big Bang.

by Shankar, Francesco and Weinberg, David H. and Miralda-Escude’, Jordi
27 pages, 16 Figures. Submitted to MNRAS

We develop semi-empirical models of the supermassive black hole and active galactic nucleus (AGN) populations, which incorporate the black hole growth implied by the observed AGN luminosity function assuming a radiative efficiency \epsilon, and a distribution of Eddington ratios \lambda. By generalizing these continuity-equation models to allow a distribution P(\lambda|mbh,z) we are able to draw on constraints from observationally estimated P(\lambda) distributions and active galaxy fractions while accounting for the luminosity thresholds of observational samples. We consider models with a Gaussian distribution of log \lambda, and Gaussians augmented with a power-law tail to low \lambda. Within our framework, reproducing the high observed AGN fractions at low redshift requires a characteristic Eddington ratio \lambda_c that declines at late times, and matching observed Eddington ratio distributions requires P(\lambda) that broadens at low redshift. To reproduce the observed increase of AGN fraction with black hole or galaxy mass, we also require a \lambda_c that decreases with increasing black hole mass, reducing the AGN luminosity associated with the most massive black holes. Finally, achieving a good match to the high mass end of the local black hole mass function requires an increased radiative efficiency at high black hole mass. We discuss the potential impact of black hole mergers or a \lambda-dependent bolometric correction, and we compute evolutionary predictions for black hole and galaxy specific accretion rates. Despite the flexibility of our framework, no one model provides a good fit to all the data we consider.

by Lamastra, Alessandra and Menci, Nicola and Fiore, Fabrizio and Di Porto, Cinzia and Amendola, Luca
19 pages, 6 figures, accepted to MNRAS

We compute the number density of massive Black Holes (BHs) at the centre of galaxies at z=6 in different Dynamical Dark Energy (DDE) cosmologies, and compare it with existing observational lower limits, to derive constraints on the evolution of the Dark Energy equation of state parameter w. Our approach only assumes the canonical scenario for structure formation from the collapse of overdense regions of the Dark Matter dominated primordial density field on progressively larger scales; the Black Hole accretion and merging rate have been maximized in the computation so as to obtain robust constraints on w and on its look-back time derivative w_a. Our results provide independent constraints complementary to those obtained by combining Supernovae, Cosmic Microwave Background and Baryonic Acoustic Oscillations; while the latter concern combinations of w_0 and w_a leaving the time evolution of the state parameter w_a highly unconstrained, the BH abundance mainly provide upper limits on w_a, only weakly depending on w_0. Combined with the existing constraints, our results significantly restrict the allowed region in DDE parameter space, ruling out DDE models not providing cosmic time and fast growth factor large enough to allow for the building up of the observed abundance of BHs; in particular, models with -1.2 \leq w_0 \leq -1 and positive redshift evolution w_a > 0.8 – completely consistent with previous constraints – are strongly disfavoured by our independent constraints from BH abundance. Such range of parameters corresponds to “Quintom” DDE models, with w crossing -1 starting from larger values.

by Comerford, Julia M. and Gerke, Brian F. and Stern, Daniel and Cooper, Michael C. and Weiner, Benjamin J. and Newman, Jeffrey A. and Harrison, Fiona and Madsen, Kristin and Barrows, R. Scott
11 pages, 8 figures, submitted to ApJ

Merger-remnant galaxies with kpc-scale separation dual active galactic nuclei (AGNs) should be widespread as a consequence of galaxy mergers and triggered gas accretion onto supermassive black holes, yet very few dual AGNs have been observed. Galaxies with double-peaked narrow AGN emission lines in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey are plausible dual AGN candidates, but their double-peaked profiles could also be the result of gas kinematics or AGN-driven outflows and jets on small or large scales. To help distinguish between these scenarios, we have obtained spatial profiles of the AGN emission via follow-up longslit spectroscopy of 81 double-peaked narrow-line AGNs in SDSS at 0.03 < z < 0.36 using Lick, Palomar, and MMT Observatories. We find that all 81 systems exhibit double AGN emission components with ~kpc projected spatial separations on the sky, which suggests that they are produced by kpc-scale dual AGNs or kpc-scale outflows, jets, or rotating gaseous disks. In addition, we find that the subsample (58%) of the objects with spatially-compact emission components may be preferentially produced by dual AGNs, while the subsample (42%) with spatially-extended emission components may be preferentially produced by AGN outflows. We also find that for 32% of the sample the two AGN emission components are preferentially aligned with the host galaxy major axis, as expected for dual AGNs orbiting in the host galaxy potential. Our results both narrow the list of possible physical mechanisms producing the double AGN components, and suggest several observational criteria for selecting the most promising dual AGN candidates from the full sample of double-peaked narrow-line AGNs. Using these criteria, we determine the 17 most compelling dual AGN candidates in our sample.

by Gaskell, C. Martin
SF2A-2011: Proceedings of the 2011 annual meeting of the French Society of Astronomy and Astrophysics. G. Alecian, K. Belkacem, S. Collin, R. Samadi and D. Valls-Gabaud (eds), p. 573. 6 pages, 4 figures

A simple refinement is proposed to the Dibai method for determining black hole masses in type-1 thermal AGNs. Comparisons with reverberation mapping black hole masses and host galaxy bulge properties suggest that the method is accurate to +/- 0.15 dex. Contrary to what was thought when the black hole mass – stellar velocity dispersion (”M – sigma”) relationship was first discovered, it does not have a lower dispersion than the black hole mass – bulge luminosity (”M – L”) relationship. The dispersion in the M – L relationship for AGNs decreases strongly with increasing black hole mass or bulge luminosity. This is naturally explained as a consequence of the black hole – bulge relationships being the result of averaging due to mergers. Simulations show that the decrease in dispersion in the M – L relationship with increasing mass is in qualitative agreement with being driven by mergers. The large scatter in AGN black hole masses at lower masses rules out significant AGN feedback. A non-causal origin of the correlations between black holes and bulges explains the frequent lack of supermassive black holes in late-type galaxies, and the lack of correlation of black hole mass with pseudo-bulges.

by Willott, Chris J.
4 pages, 2 figures, ApJ Letters, in press

It has been claimed that there is a large population of obscured, accreting black holes at high-redshift and that the integrated black hole density at z=6 as inferred from X-ray observations is ~100 times greater than inferred from optical quasars. I have performed a stacking analysis of very deep Chandra X-ray data at the positions of photometrically-selected z=6 galaxy candidates. It is found that there is no evidence for a stacked X-ray signal in either the soft (0.5-2 keV) or hard (2-8 keV) X-ray bands. Previous work which reported a significant signal is affected by an incorrect method of background subtraction which underestimates the true background within the target aperture. The puzzle remains of why the z=6 black hole mass function has such a flat slope and a low normalization compared to the stellar mass function.

by Park, KwangHo and Ricotti, Massimo
27 pages, 10 figures, submitted to ApJ, for associated mpeg files, see http://www.astro.umd.edu/~kpark/research.html

In this paper, the second of a series on radiation-regulated accretion onto black holes(BHs) from galactic scales, we focus on the effects that radiation pressure and angular momentum of the gas have on the periodic and short-lived luminosity bursts found when thermal pressure of the ionized sphere around the BH regulates the accretion rate. Our simulations focus on intermediate-mass BH, but we derive general scaling relationships that are solutions of the classic Bondi problem when radiation feedback is considered. We find that for ambient gas densities(n) exceeding a critical value n (5×10^6 cm^{-3})/M_2, where M_2 is the mass of the BH in units of 100 solar masses, the period of the oscillations decreases rapidly and the duty cycle increases from 6% to 50%. However, the maximum and mean accretion rates become Eddington limited only if n>n_Edd n_cr/T_4 where T_4 is the ambient gas temperature in units of 10^4 K. In the sub-Eddington regime, the mean accretion rate onto BH is about 1% T_4^{2.5} of the Bondi rate, thus is proportional to the thermal pressure of the ambient medium. The period of the oscillations coincides with depletion time scale of the gas inside the hot ionized bubble surrounding the BH. For n~n_cr accretion onto the BH becomes the dominant gas depletion mechanism, explaining the rapid decrease of the period of the oscillations and increasing the duty cycle. Angular momentum of the accreting gas produces a time delay between the accretion rate near the sonic point and the luminosity output. Generally, assuming reasonable values of the time delay calculated using an alpha-model for a thin disk, angular momentum does not affect significantly the accretion rate and period of the oscillations.

by Dotti, M. and Sesana, A. and Decarli, R.
4 Figures. Accepted for publication in Advances in Astronomy

The study of the dynamical evolution of massive black hole pairs in mergers is crucial in the context of a hierarchical galaxy formation scenario. The timescales for the formation and the coalescence of black hole binaries are still poorly constrained, resulting in large uncertainties in the expected rate of massive black hole binaries detectable in the electromagnetic and gravitational wave spectra. Here we review the current theoretical understanding of the black hole pairing in galaxy mergers, with a particular attention to recent developments and open issues. We conclude with a review of the expected observational signatures of massive binaries, and of the candidates discussed in literature to date.

by Farrell, S. and Servillat, M. and Pforr, J. and Maccarone, T. and Knigge, C. and Godet, O. and Maraston, C. and Webb, N. and Barret, D. and Gosling, A. and Belmont, R. and Wiersema, K.
10 pages, 2 figures, submitted to ApJL

We present Hubble Space Telescope and simultaneous Swift X-ray telescope observations of the strongest candidate intermediate mass black hole ESO 243-49 HLX-1. Fitting the spectral energy distribution from X-ray to near-infrared wavelengths showed that the broadband spectrum is not consistent with simple and irradiated disc models, but is well described by a model comprised of an irradiated accretion disc plus a stellar population with a mass ~1E6 Msun. The age of the population cannot be uniquely constrained, with both very young and very old stellar populations allowed. However, the very old solution requires excessively high levels of disc reprocessing and an extremely small disc, leading us to favour the young solution with an age of ~13 Myr. In addition, the presence of dust lanes and the lack of any nuclear activity from X-ray observations of the host galaxy lead us to propose that a gas-rich minor merger may have taken place less than ~200 Myr ago. Such a merger event would explain the presence of the intermediate mass black hole and support a young stellar population.

by Meiron, Yohai and Laor, Ari
12 pages, 9 figures

We present a new approach to studying the evolution of massive black hole binaries in a stellar environment. By imposing conservation of total energy and angular momentum in scattering experiments, we find the dissipation forces that are exerted on the black holes by the stars, and thus obtain the decaying path of the binary from the classical dynamical friction regime down to subparsec scales. Our scheme lies between scattering experiments and N-body simulations. While still resolving collisions between stars and black holes, it is fast enough and allows to use a large enough number of particles to reach a smooth and convergent result. We studied both an equal mass and a 10:1 mass ratio binaries under various initial conditions. We show that while an equal mass binary stalls at a nearly circular orbit, a runaway growth of eccentricity occurs in the unequal mass case. This effect reduces the timescale for black hole coalescence through gravitational radiation to well below the Hubble time, even in spherical and gasless systems formed by dry mergers.

by Sesana, A.
21 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in Advances in Astronomy

I review our current understanding of massive black hole (MBH) formation and evolution along the cosmic history. After a brief introductory overview of the relevance of MBHs in the hierarchical structure formation paradigm, I discuss the main viable channels for seed BH formation at high redshift and for their subsequent mass growth and spin evolution. The emerging hierarchical picture, where MBHs grow through merger triggered accretion episodes, acquiring their mass while shining as quasars, is overall robust, but too simplistic to explain the diversity observed in MBH phenomenology. I briefly discuss which future observations will help to shed light on the MBH cosmic history in the near future, paying particular attention to the upcoming gravitational wave window.

by Yagi, Kent and Stein, Leo C. and Yunes, Nicolas and Tanaka, Takahiro
26 pages, 3 figures, 2 tables; submitted to PRD

We consider a general class of quantum gravity-inspired, modified gravity theories, where the Einstein-Hilbert action is extended through the addition of all terms quadratic in the curvature tensor coupled to scalar fields with standard kinetic energy. This class of theories includes Einstein-Dilaton-Gauss-Bonnet and Chern-Simons modified gravity as special cases. We analytically derive and solve the coupled field equations in the post-Newtonian approximation, assuming a comparable-mass, spinning black hole binary source in a quasi-circular, weak-field/slow-motion orbit. We find that a naive subtraction of divergent piece associated with the point-particle approximation is ill-suited to represent compact objects in these theories. Instead, we model them by appropriate effective sources built so that known strong-field solutions are reproduced in the far-field limit. In doing so, we prove that black holes in Einstein-Dilaton-Gauss-Bonnet and Chern-Simons theory can have hair, while neutron stars have no scalar monopole charge, in diametrical opposition to results in scalar-tensor theories. We then employ techniques similar to the direct integration of the relaxed Einstein equations to obtain analytic expressions for the scalar field, metric perturbation, and the associated gravitational wave luminosity measured at infinity. We find that scalar field emission mainly dominates the energy flux budget, sourcing electric-type (even-parity) dipole scalar radiation and magnetic-type (odd-parity) quadrupole scalar radiation, correcting the General Relativistic prediction at relative -1PN and 2PN orders. Such modifications lead to corrections in the emitted gravitational waves that can be mapped to the parameterized post-Einsteinian framework. Such modifications could be strongly constrained with gravitational wave observations.

by Antonini, Fabio and Capuzzo-Dolcetta, Roberto and Mastrobuono-Battisti, Alessandra and Merritt, David
15 pages, 14 figure. Submitted to ApJ

In one widely discussed model for the formation of nuclear star clusters (NSCs), massive globular clusters spiral into the center of a galaxy and merge to form the nucleus. It is now known that at least some NSCs coexist with supermassive black holes (SBHs); this is the case, for instance, in the Milky Way (MW). In this paper, we investigate how the presence of a SMBH at the center of the MW impacts the merger hypothesis for the formation of its NSC. Starting from a model consisting of a low-density nuclear stellar disk and the SMBH, we use N-body simulations to follow the successive inspiral and merger of (12) globular clusters. The clusters are started on circular orbits of radius 20 pc, and their initial masses and radii are set up in such a way as to be consistent with the galactic tidal field at that radius. The total accumulated mass is about 1.5×10^7 Solar masses. Each cluster is disrupted by the SMBH at a distance of roughly one parsec. The density profile that results after the final inspiral event is characterized by a core of roughly this radius, and an envelope with density that falls off rho \sim r^-2. These properties are similar to those of the MW NSC, with the exception of the core size, which in the MW is a little smaller. But by continuing the evolution of the model after the final inspiral event, we find that the core shrinks substantially via gravitational encounters in a time (when scaled to the MW) of 10 Gyr as the stellar distribution evolves toward a Bahcall-Wolf cusp. We also show that the luminosity function of the MW NSC is consistent with the hypothesis that a large fraction of the mass comes from (~10Gyr) old stars, brought in by globular clusters. We conclude that a model in which a large fraction of the mass of the MW NSC arose from infalling globular clusters is consistent with existing observational constraints.

by Begelman, Mitchell C.
13 pages, 8 figures, to appear in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

We reformulate the adiabatic inflow-outflow (ADIOS) model for radiatively inefficient accretion flows, treating the inflow and outflow zones on an equal footing. For purely adiabatic flows (i.e., with no radiative losses), we show that the mass flux in each zone must satisfy Mdot ~ R^n with n=1, in contrast to previous work in which 0<n< 1 is a free parameter but in rough agreement with numerical simulations. We also demonstrate that the resulting two-zone ADIOS models are not dynamically self-consistent without the introduction of an energy source close in to the central regions of the flow; we identify this with the energy liberated by accretion. We explore the parameter space of non-radiative models and show that both powerful winds and gentle breezes are possible. When small radiative losses (with fixed efficiency) are included, any centrally injected energy flux is radiated away and the system reverts to a power-law behavior with n < 1, where n falls in a small range determined by the fractional level of radiative losses. We also present an ADIOS model for hypercritical (super-Eddington) disk accretion, in which the radiative losses are closely related to the flow geometry. We suggest that hyperaccretion can lead to either winds or breezes.

by Mirshekari, Saeed and Yunes, Nicolas and Will, Clifford M.
11 pages, 3 figures, 2 tables. Submitted to Phys. Rev. D

Modified gravity theories generically predict a violation of Lorentz invariance, which may lead to a modified dispersion relation for propagating modes of gravitational waves. We construct a parametrized dispersion relation that can reproduce a range of known Lorentz-violating predictions and investigate their impact on the propagation of gravitational waves. A modified dispersion relation forces different wavelengths of the gravitational wave train to travel at slightly different velocities, leading to a modified phase evolution observed at a gravitational-wave detector. We show how such corrections map to the waveform observable and to the parametrized post-Einsteinian framework, proposed to model a range of deviations from General Relativity. Given a gravitational-wave detection, the lack of evidence for such corrections could then be used to place a constraint on Lorentz violation. The constraints we obtain are tightest for dispersion relations that scale with small power of the graviton’s momentum and deteriorate for a steeper scaling.

by Li, Gongjie and Conroy, Charlie and Loeb, Abraham
8 pages, 3 figures, 2 tables

We investigate the evolution of the MBH-{\sigma} relation by examining the relationship between the intrinsic scatter in the MBH-{\sigma} relation and galaxy bolometric nuclear luminosity, the latter being a probe of the accretion rate of the black hole (BH). Our sample is composed of galaxies with classical bulges when possible, of which 38 have dynamically measured BHs masses, and 17 have BHs masses measured by reverberation mapping. In order to obtain the bolometric nuclear luminosity for galaxies with low nuclear luminosity, we convert the X-ray nuclear luminosity measured by Chandra to bolometric luminosity. We find that the scatter in the MBH-{\sigma} relation is uncorrelated with nuclear luminosity over seven orders of magnitude in luminosity, with the high luminosity end approaching the Eddington luminosity. This suggests that at the present epoch galaxies evolve along the MBH-{\sigma} relation. This conclusion is consistent with the standard paradigm that BHs grow contemporaneously with their host stellar spheroids.

by Decarli, Roberto and Falomo, Renato and Kotilainen, Jari K. and Hyvonen, Tomi and Uslenghi, Michela and Treves, Aldo
Accepted for publication in Advances in Astronomy. To appear in the special issue: “Seeking for the Leading Actor on the Cosmic Stage: Galaxies versus Supermassive Black Holes”

The Mbh-Mhost relation in quasars has been probed only in a limited parameter space, namely at Mbh~10^9 Msun and Mhost~10^12 Msun. Here we present a study of 26 quasars lying in the low-mass end of the relation, down to Mbh~10^7 Msun. We selected quasars from the SDSS and HST-FOS archives, requiring modest Mbh (as derived through the virial paradigm). We imaged our sources in H band from the Nordic Optical Telescope. The quasar host galaxies have been resolved in 25 out of 26 observed targets. Host galaxy luminosities and stellar masses are computed, under reasonable assumptions on their star formation histories. Combining these results with those from our previous studies, we manage to extend the sampled parameter space of the Mbh-Mhost relation in quasars. The relation holds over 2 dex in both the parameters, similarly to what observed in low-luminosity AGN and in quiescent galaxies. For the first time, we are able to measure the slope of the Mbh-Mhost relation in quasars. We find that it is consistent with the linear case (similarly to what observed in quiescent galaxies). We do not find any evidence of a population of massive black holes lying below the relation.

by Li, Nan and Mao, Shude and Gao, Liang and Loeb, Abraham and Di Stefano, R.
9 pages, 5 figures

Recent observations indicate that many if not all galaxies host massive central black holes (BHs). In this paper we explore the influence of supermassive binary black holes (SMBBHs) on their actions as gravitational lenses. When lenses are modelled as singular isothermal ellipsoids, binary black holes change the critical curves and caustics differently as a function of distance. Each black hole can in principle create at least one additional image, which, if observed, provides evidence of black holes. By studying how SMBBHs affect the cumulative distribution of magnification for images created by black holes, we find that the cross section for at least one such additional image to have a magnification larger than $latex 10^{-5}$ is comparable to the cross section for producing multiple-images in singular isothermal lenses. Such additional images may be detectable with high-resolution and large dynamic range maps of multiply-imaged systems from future facilities, such as the SKA. The probability of detecting at least one image (two images) with magnification above $latex 10^{-3}$ is $latex \sim 0.2 \fBH$ ($latex \sim 0.05 \fBH$) in a multiply-imaged lens system, where $latex \fBH$ is the fraction of galaxies housing binary black holes. We also study the effects of SMBBHs on the core images when galaxies have shallower central density profiles (modelled as non-singular isothermal ellipsoids). We find that the cross section of the usually faint core images is further suppressed by SMBBHs. Thus their presence should also be taken into account when one constrains the core radius from the lack of central images in gravitational lenses.

by Kocsis, Bence and Levin, Janna
14 pages, 10 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev. D

Galactic nuclei are densely populated by stellar mass compact objects such as black holes and neutron stars. Bound, highly eccentric binaries form as a result of gravitational wave (GW) losses during close flybys between these objects. We study the evolution of these systems using 2.5 and 3.5 order post-Newtonian equations of motion. The GW signal consists of many thousand repeated bursts (RB) for minutes to days (depending on the impact parameter and masses), followed by a powerful GW chirp and an eccentric merger. We show that a significant signal to noise ratio (SNR) accumulates already in the RB phase, corresponding to a detection limit around 200–300 Mpc and 300–600 Mpc for Advanced LIGO for an average orientation BH/NS or BH/BH binary, respectively. The theoretical errors introduced by the inaccuracy of the PN templates are typically much less severe for the RB phase than in the following eccentric merger. The GW signal in the RB phase is broadband; we show that encounters involving intermediate mass black holes are detectable in multiple frequency bands coincidentally using LIGO and LISA.

by Li, Yuexing
8 pages, 4 figures. Submitted to ApJ

The origin of the supermassive black holes that power the most distant quasars observed is largely unknown. One hypothesis is that they grew rapidly from intermediate-mass seeds (~100 M_sun) left by the first stars. However, some previous studies argued that accretion onto these black holes was too low to build up the mass due to strong suppression by radiative feedback. Here, we re-exam the accretion process of such a black hole embedded in a primordial gas cloud, by considering a wide range of physical and numerical parameters not explored before. We find that, while radiative heating and pressure indeed suppress accretion effectively, self-gravity of the gas eventually overcomes the feedback effects and boosts the accretion to the Eddington rate after one free-fall timescale of the cloud. Moreover, for a given black hole mass, there exists a critical density above which the accretion can reach Eddington limit. Furthermore, we find a universal correlation between black hole accretion rate and ambient gas density, which may serve as a realistic recipe for black hole growth in simulations.