Conference proceeding
Black hole binaries from star clusters (interferometric gravitational-wave detection)
Astrophysical sources for ground-based gravitational wave detectors; Proceedings of the Conference, Philadelphia, PA; UNITED STATES; 30 Oct.-1 Nov. 2000, pp.119-129
01 Oct 2001
Abstract
In star clusters, black holes become the most massive objects within a few tens of millions of years; dynamical relaxation then causes them to sink to the cluster core, where they form binaries. These black-hole binaries become more tightly bound by superelastic encounters with other cluster members, and are ultimately ejected from the cluster. The majority of escaping black-hole binaries have orbital periods short enough and eccentricities high enough that the emission of gravitational radiation causes them to coalesce within a few billion years. We predict a black hole merger rate of about 3 x 10 exp -7 per year per cubic megaparsec. Young star clusters in galactic nuclei may also contribute significantly to this total, although their numbers are presently very uncertain. For the first-generation Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO-I), this implies one or two detections during the first two years of operation. For LIGO-II, the rate rises to roughly one detection per day. (Author)
Metrics
8 Record Views
Details
- Title
- Black hole binaries from star clusters (interferometric gravitational-wave detection)
- Creators
- Stephen McMillanSimon Portegies Zwart
- Publication Details
- Astrophysical sources for ground-based gravitational wave detectors; Proceedings of the Conference, Philadelphia, PA; UNITED STATES; 30 Oct.-1 Nov. 2000, pp.119-129
- Conference
- Astrophysical sources for ground-based gravitational wave detectors Conference (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States, 30 Oct 2000 - 01 Nov 2000)
- Number of pages
- 1
- Resource Type
- Conference proceeding
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- Physics
- Identifiers
- 991019170478504721