When and where did GW150914 form?
Abstract
The recent LIGO detection of gravitational waves (GW150914), likely originating from the merger of two ∼ 30M_⊙ black holes suggests progenitor stars of low metallicity ([Z/Z_⊙] ≲ 0.3), constraining when and where the progenitor of GW150914 may have formed. We combine estimates of galaxy properties (star-forming gas metallicity, star formation rate and merger rate) across cosmic time to predict the low redshift black hole – black hole merger rate as a function of present day host galaxy mass, M_(gal), the formation redshift of the progenitor system z_f and different progenitor metallicities Z_p. For Z_p ⩾ 0.1Z_⊙, the signal is dominated by binaries in massive galaxies with z_f ≃ 2 while below Z_p ⩽ 0.1Z_⊙ most mergers come from binaries formed around z_f ≃ 0.5 in dwarf galaxies. Additional gravitational wave detections from merging massive black holes will provide constraints on the mass–metallicity relation and massive star formation at high redshifts.
Additional Information
© 2016 The Authors Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Royal Astronomical Society. Accepted 2016 July 27. Received 2016 July 13; in original form 2016 May 27. First published online July 30, 2016. Support for AL and PFH was provided by an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship, NASA ATP Grant NNX14AH35G, and NSF Collaborative Research Grant No. 1411920 and CAREER Grant No. 1455342. Support for SGK was provided by NASA through Einstein Postdoctoral Fellowship Grant No. PF5-160136 awarded by the Chandra X-ray Center, which is operated by the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory for NASA under contract NAS8-03060. DC was supported through the Walter Burke Institute for Theoretical Physics and the Sherman Fairchild Foundation and the Caltech Department of Astronomy. The authors thank Chris Pankow, Evan Kirby, Xiangcheng Ma, Fangzhou Jiang, and Peter Behroozi for very helpful and stimulating discussions. We thank the referee for a constructive report that improved and clarified the Letter.Attached Files
Published - MNRAS-2016-Lamberts-L31-5.pdf
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Additional details
- Eprint ID
- 71622
- Resolver ID
- CaltechAUTHORS:20161031-112035738
- Alfred P. Sloan Foundation
- NNX14AH35G
- NASA
- AST-1411920
- NSF
- AST-1455342
- NSF
- PF5-160136
- NASA Einstein Postdoctoral Fellowship
- NAS8-03060
- NASA
- Walter Burke Institute for Theoretical Physics, Caltech
- Sherman Fairchild Foundation
- Caltech
- Created
-
2016-10-31Created from EPrint's datestamp field
- Updated
-
2021-11-11Created from EPrint's last_modified field
- Caltech groups
- TAPIR, Walter Burke Institute for Theoretical Physics