Four‐Body Effects in Globular Cluster Black Hole Coalescence

Abstract

In the high-density cores of globular clusters, multibody interactions are expected to be common, with the result that black holes in binaries are hardened by interactions. It was shown by Sigurdsson and Hernquist, Kulkarni, Hut, and McMillan, and others in 1993 that 10 M☉ black holes interacting exclusively by three-body encounters do not merge in the clusters themselves, because recoil kicks the binaries out of the clusters before the binaries are tight enough to merge. Here we consider a new mechanism, involving four-body encounters. Numerical simulations by a number of authors suggest that roughly 20%-50% of binary-binary encounters will eject one star but leave behind a stable hierarchical triple. If the orbital plane of the inner binary is strongly tilted with respect to the orbital plane of the outer object, a secular Kozai resonance, first investigated in the context of asteroids in the solar system, can increase the eccentricity of the inner body significantly. We show that in a substantial fraction of cases, the eccentricity is driven to a high enough value that the inner binary will merge by gravitational radiation, without a strong accompanying kick. Thus, the merged object remains in the cluster; depending on the binary fraction of black holes and the inclination distribution of newly formed hierarchical triples, this mechanism may allow massive black holes to accumulate through successive mergers in the cores of globular clusters. It may also increase the likelihood that stellar-mass black holes in globular clusters will be detectable by their gravitational radiation.