Nuclear Star Cluster Research Articles

On the Origin of GW190521-like Events from Repeated Black Hole Mergers in Star Clusters

Abstract LIGO and Virgo have reported the detection of GW190521, from the merger of a binary black hole (BBH) with a total mass around 150 M ⊙. While current stellar models limit the mass of any black hole (BH) remnant to about 40–50 M ⊙, more massive BHs can be produced dynamically through repeated mergers in the core of a dense star cluster. The process is limited by the recoil kick (due to anisotropic emission of gravitational radiation) imparted to merger remnants, which can escape the parent cluster, thereby terminating growth. We study the role of the host cluster metallicity and escape speed in the buildup of massive BHs through repeated mergers. Almost independent of host metallicity, we find that a BBH of about 150 M ⊙ could be formed dynamically in any star cluster with escape speed ≳200 km s−1, as found in galactic nuclear star clusters as well as the most massive globular clusters and super star clusters. Using an inspiral-only waveform, we compute the detection probability for different primary masses (≥60 M ⊙) as a function of secondary mass and find that the detection probability increases with secondary mass and decreases for larger primary mass and redshift. Future additional detections of massive BBH mergers will be of fundamental importance for understanding the growth of massive BHs through dynamics and the formation of intermediate-mass BHs.

Revealing the Formation of the Milky Way Nuclear Star Cluster via Chemo-dynamical Modeling

Abstract The Milky Way nuclear star cluster (MW NSC) has been used as a template to understand the origin and evolution of galactic nuclei and the interaction of nuclear star clusters with supermassive black holes. It is the only nuclear star cluster with a supermassive black hole where we can resolve individual stars to measure their kinematics and metal abundance to reconstruct its formation history. Here, we present results of the first chemo-dynamical model of the inner 1 pc of the MW NSC using metallicity and radial velocity data from the KMOS spectrograph on the Very Large Telescope. We find evidence for two kinematically and chemically distinct components in this region. The majority of the stars belong to a previously known supersolar metallicity component with a rotation axis perpendicular to the Galactic plane. However, we identify a new kinematically distinct subsolar metallicity component that contains about 7% of the stars and appears to be rotating faster than the main component with a rotation axis that may be misaligned. This second component may be evidence for an infalling star cluster or remnants of a dwarf galaxy, merging with the MW NSC. These measurements show that the combination of chemical abundances with kinematics is a promising method to directly study the MW NSC’s origin and evolution.

The Near-infrared Spectrum of the Nuclear Star Cluster: Looking below the Tip of the Iceberg, and Comparisons with Extragalactic Nuclei*

Abstract Long-slit near-infrared (NIR) spectra of the Galactic nuclear star cluster (NSC) are discussed. The spectra sample the major axis of the NSC out to its half-light radius. The absorption spectrum of the central regions of the NSC is averaged over angular scales of tens of arc seconds in order to sample globular cluster-like total luminosities, and the results are compared with model spectra. The equivalent widths of Na i2.21 μm and Ca 2.26 μm outside of the center of the NSC, where light from nuclear bulge stars contributes a large fraction to the total flux, are consistent with solar chemical mixtures. In contrast, the equivalent widths of Na i2.21 μm and Ca i2.26 μm near the center of the NSC are larger than expected from models with solar chemical mixtures, even after light from the brightest evolved stars is removed. The depths of spectroscopic features changing along the major axis of the NSC are consistent with imaging studies that have found evidence of population gradients in the NSC. That Na i2.21 μm and Ca i2.26 μm are deeper than predicted for solar chemical mixtures over a range of evolutionary states is consistent with previous studies that find that the majority of stars near the center of the NSC formed from material that had nonsolar chemical mixtures. The depths of the Na i2.21 μm and Ca i2.26 μm features in the central regions of the NSC are comparable to those in the nuclear spectrum of the early-type Virgo disk galaxy NGC 4491, and are deeper than in the central spectra of NGC 253 and 7793. A spectrum of nebular emission and the youngest stars near the galactic center is also extracted. The equivalent widths of emission features in the extracted NIR spectrum are similar to those in the nuclear spectrum of NGC 253, and it is argued that this agreement is best achieved if the current episode of star formation near the center of the NSC has been in progress for at least a few megayears.

The Milky Way’s nuclear star cluster: Old, metal-rich, and cuspy

Context. The environment of Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*), the central black hole of the Milky Way, is the only place in the Universe where we can currently study the interaction between a nuclear star cluster and a massive black hole and infer the properties of a nuclear cluster from observations of individual stars. Aims. This work aims to explore the star formation history of the nuclear cluster and the structure of the innermost stellar cusp around Sgr A*. Methods. We combined and analysed multi epoch high quality AO observations. For the region close to Sgr A* we apply the speckle holography technique to the AO data and obtain images that are ≥50% complete down to Ks ≈ 19 within a projected radius of 5″ around Sgr A*. We used H-band images to derive extinction maps. Results. We provide Ks photometry for roughly 39 000 stars and H-band photometry for ∼11 000 stars within a field of about 40″ × 40″, centred on Sgr A*. In addition, we provide Ks photometry of ∼3000 stars in a very deep central field of 10″ × 10″, centred on Sgr A*. We find that the Ks luminosity function (KLF) is rather homogeneous within the studied field and does not show any significant changes as a function of distance from the central black hole on scales of a few 0.1 pc. By fitting theoretical luminosity functions to the KLF, we derive the star formation history of the nuclear star cluster. We find that about 80% of the original star formation took place 10 Gyr ago or longer, followed by a largely quiescent phase that lasted for more than 5 Gyr. We clearly detect the presence of intermediate-age stars of about 3 Gyr in age. This event makes up about 15% of the originally formed stellar mass of the cluster. A few percent of the stellar mass formed in the past few 100 Myr. Our results appear to be inconsistent with a quasi-continuous star formation history. The mean metallicity of the stars is consistent with being slightly super solar. The stellar density increases exponentially towards Sgr A* at all magnitudes between Ks = 15−19. We also show that the precise properties of the stellar cusp around Sgr A* are hard to determine because the star formation history suggests that the star counts can be significantly contaminated, at all magnitudes, by stars that are too young to be dynamically relaxed. We find that the probability of observing any young (non-millisecond) pulsar in a tight orbit around Sgr A* and beamed towards Earth is very low. We argue that typical globular clusters, such as they are observed in and around the Milky Way today, have probably not contributed to the nuclear cluster’s mass in any significant way. The nuclear cluster may have formed following major merger events in the early history of the Milky Way.

Repeated mergers and ejection of black holes within nuclear star clusters

ABSTRACT Current stellar evolution models predict a dearth of black holes (BHs) with masses $\gtrsim \! 50\, \rm M_\odot$ and $\lesssim \! 5\, \rm M_\odot$, and intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs; $\sim \! 10^2\!-\! 10^5\rm\, M_\odot$) have not yet been detected beyond any reasonable doubt. A natural way to form massive BHs is through repeated mergers, detectable via gravitational wave emission with current LIGO/Virgo or future LISA and ET observations. Nuclear star clusters (NSCs) have masses and densities high enough to retain most of the merger products, which acquire a recoil kick at the moment of merger. We explore the possibility that IMBHs may be born as a result of repeated mergers in NSCs, and show how their formation pathways depend on the NSC mass and density, and BH spin distribution. We find that BHs in the pair-instability mass gap can be formed and observed by LIGO/Virgo, and show that the typical mass of the ejected massive BHs is 400–$500\, \rm M_\odot$, with velocities of up to a few thousand $\, \rm km\, s^{-1}$. Eventually, some of these IMBHs can become the seeds of supermassive BHs, observed today in the centres of galaxies. In dwarf galaxies, they could potentially solve the abundance, core-cusp, too-big-to-fail, ultra-faint, and baryon-fraction issues via plausible feedback scenarios.

Luminosity Models and Density Profiles for Nuclear Star Clusters for a Nearby Volume-limited Sample of 29 Galaxies

Abstract Nuclear star clusters (NSCs) are dense stellar clusters that are found at the centers of a majority of galaxies. In this paper, we study the density profiles for 29 galaxies in a volume-limited survey within 10 Mpc to characterize their NSCs. These galaxies span a 3 × 108–8 × 1010 M ⊙ and a wide range of Hubble types. We use high-resolution Hubble Space Telescope archival data to create luminosity models for the galaxies using Sérsic profiles to parameterize the NSCs. We also provide estimates for photometric masses of NSCs and their host galaxies using color–M/L relationships and examine their correlation. We use the multi-Gaussian expansion to derive the NSC densities and their 3D mass-density profiles. The 3D density profiles characterize the NSC densities on scales as small as ∼1 pc, approaching the likely spheres of influence for BHs in these objects. We find that these densities correlate with galaxy mass, with NSC density profiles becoming both denser and flatter at higher galaxy masses. Most galaxy NSCs are denser than typical globular clusters. We parameterize the 3D NSC density profiles and their scatter and slope as a function of galaxy stellar mass to enable the construction of realistic nuclear mass profiles. Our fitted profiles and the derived relations are useful in predicting the rate of tidal disruption events in galaxies. We will verify the results of this paper in a follow-up paper that presents the dynamical modeling of the same sample of NSCs.

Formation of low-spinning 100 M⊙ black holes

Aims. It is speculated that a merger of two massive stellar-origin black holes in a dense stellar environment may lead to the formation of a massive black hole in the pair-instability mass gap (∼50−135 M⊙). Such a merger-formed black hole is expected to typically have a high spin (a ∼ 0.7). If such a massive black hole acquires another black hole it may lead to another merger detectable by LIGO/Virgo in gravitational waves. Acquiring a companion may be hindered by gravitational-wave kick/recoil, which accompanies the first merger and may quickly remove the massive black hole from its parent globular or nuclear cluster. We test whether it is possible for a massive merger-formed black hole in the pair-instability gap to be retained in its parent cluster and have low spin. Such a black hole would be indistinguishable from a primordial black hole. Methods. We employed results from numerical relativity calculations of black hole mergers to explore the range of gravitational-wave recoil velocities for various combinations of merging black hole masses and spins. We compared merger-formed massive black hole speeds with typical escape velocities from globular and nuclear clusters. Results. We show that a globular cluster is highly unlikely to form and retain a ∼100 M⊙ black hole if the spin of the black hole is low (a ≲ 0.3). Massive merger-formed black holes with low spins acquire high recoil speeds (≳ 200 km s−1) from gravitational-wave kick during formation that exceed typical escape speeds from globular clusters (∼ 50 km s−1). However, a very low-spinning (a ∼ 0.1) and massive (∼100 M⊙) black hole could be formed and retained in a galactic nuclear star cluster. Even though such massive merger-formed black holes with such low spins acquire high speeds during formation (∼ 400 km s−1), they may avoid ejection since massive nuclear clusters have high escape velocities (∼ 300−500 km s−1). A future detection of a massive black hole in the pair-instability mass gap with low spin would therefore not be proof of the existence of primordial black holes, which are sometimes claimed to have low spins and arbitrarily high masses.

A Low-mass Stellar-debris Stream Associated with a Globular Cluster Pair in the Halo

Abstract There are expected to be physical relationships between the globular clusters (GCs) and stellar substructures in the Milky Way, not all of which have yet been found. We search for such substructures from a combined halo sample of SDSS blue horizontal-branch and SDSS+LAMOST RR Lyrae stars, cross-matched with astrometric information from Gaia DR2. This is a sample of old stars which are also excellent tracers of structures, ideal for searching for ancient relics in the outer stellar halo. By applying the neural-network-based method StarGO to the full 4D dynamical space of our sample, we rediscover the Sagittarius Stream, and find the debris of the Gaia-Enceladus-Sausage and the Sequoia events in the outer halo, as well as their linkages with several GCs. Most importantly, we find a new, low-mass, debris stream associated with a pair of GCs (NGC 5024 and NGC 5053), which we dub LMS-1. This stream has a very polar orbit, and occupies a region between 10 to 20 kpc from the Galactic center. NGC 5024 (M53), the more massive of the associated GC pair, is very likely the nuclear star cluster of a now-disrupted dwarf galaxy progenitor, based on the results from N-body simulations.

Petar: a high-performance N-body code for modelling massive collisional stellar systems

ABSTRACTThe numerical simulations of massive collisional stellar systems, such as globular clusters (GCs), are very time consuming. Until now, only a few realistic million-body simulations of GCs with a small fraction of binaries ($5{{\ \rm per\ cent}}$) have been performed by using the nbody6++gpu code. Such models took half a year computational time on a Graphic Processing Unit (GPU)-based supercomputer. In this work, we develop a new N-body code, petar, by combining the methods of Barnes–Hut tree, Hermite integrator and slow-down algorithmic regularization. The code can accurately handle an arbitrary fraction of multiple systems (e.g. binaries and triples) while keeping a high performance by using the hybrid parallelization methods with mpi, openmp, simd instructions and GPU. A few benchmarks indicate that petar and nbody6++gpu have a very good agreement on the long-term evolution of the global structure, binary orbits and escapers. On a highly configured GPU desktop computer, the performance of a million-body simulation with all stars in binaries by using petar is 11 times faster than that of nbody6++gpu. Moreover, on the Cray XC50 supercomputer, petar well scales when number of cores increase. The 10 million-body problem, which covers the region of ultracompact dwarfs and nuclear star clusters, becomes possible to be solved.

Enhancement of the tidal disruption event rate in galaxies with a nuclear star cluster: from dwarfs to ellipticals

ABSTRACT We compute the tidal disruption event (TDE) rate around local massive black holes (MBHs) with masses as low as $2.5\times 10^4\, \mathrm{M}_{\odot }$, thus probing the dwarf regime for the first time. We select a sample of 37 galaxies for which we have the surface stellar density profile, a dynamical estimate of the mass of the MBH, and 6 of which, including our Milky Way, have a resolved nuclear star cluster (NSC). For the Milky Way, we find a total TDE rate of ${\sim}10^{-4}\, \mathrm{yr}^{-1}$ when taking the NSC in account, and ${\sim}10^{-7} \, \mathrm{yr}^{-1}$ otherwise. TDEs are mainly sourced from the NSC for light (${\lt}3\times 10^{10}\, \mathrm{M}_{\odot }$) galaxies, with a rate of few $10^{-5}\, \mathrm{yr}^{-1}$, and an enhancement of up to two orders of magnitude compared to non-nucleated galaxies. We create a mock population of galaxies using different sets of scaling relations to explore trends with galaxy mass, taking into account the nucleated fraction of galaxies. Overall, we find a rate of few $10^{-5}\, \mathrm{yr}^{-1}$ which drops when galaxies are more massive than $10^{11}\, \mathrm{M}_{\odot }$ and contain MBHs swallowing stars whole and resulting in no observable TDE.

Multiple ultralight axionic wave dark matter and astronomical structures

An ultralight scalar boson with mass $m_1 \simeq 10^{-22}$ eV is gaining credence as a Dark Matter (DM) candidate that explains the dark cores of dwarf galaxies as soliton waves. Such a boson is naturally interpreted as an axion generic in String Theory, with multiple light axions predicted in this context. We examine the possibility of soliton structures over a wide range of scales, accounting for galaxy core masses and the common presence of nuclear star clusters. We present a diagnostic soliton core mass-radius plot that provides a global view, indicating the existence of an additional axion with mass $m_2\simeq 10^{-20}$ eV, with the possibility of a third axion with mass $m_3 \gtrsim 0.5 \times 10^{-18}$ eV. We also argue that the relative mass densities measured for these axions are consistent with their cosmological production via the mis-alignment mechanism.

Is Fornax 4 the nuclear star cluster of the Fornax dwarf spheroidal galaxy?

ABSTRACT Fornax 4 is the most distinctive globular cluster in the Fornax dwarf spheroidal. Located close to the centre of the galaxy, more metal-rich and potentially younger than its four companions (namely, Fornax clusters number 1, 2, 3, and 5), it has been suggested to have experienced a different formation than the other clusters in the galaxy. Here, we use Hubble Space Telescope/WFC3 photometry to characterize the stellar population content of this system and shed new light on its nature. By means of a detailed comparison of synthetic horizontal branch and red giant branch with the observed colour–magnitude diagrams, we find that this system likely hosts stellar sub-populations characterized by a significant iron spread up to Δ[Fe/H] ∼ 0.4 dex and possibly by also some degree of He abundance variations ΔY ∼ 0.03. We argue that this purely observational evidence, combined with the other peculiarities characterizing this system, supports the possibility that Fornax 4 is the nuclear star cluster of the Fornax dwarf spheroidal galaxy. A spectroscopic follow-up for a large number of resolved member stars is needed to confirm this interesting result and to study in detail the formation and early evolution of this system and more in general the process of galaxy nucleation.

The Three Young Nuclear Super Star Clusters in NGC 5253

Abstract The blue compact dwarf galaxy NGC 5253 hosts a very young central starburst. The center contains intense radio thermal emission from a massive ultracompact H ii region (or supernebula) and two massive and very young super star clusters (SSCs), which are seen at optical and infrared wavelengths. The spatial correspondence between these three objects over an area of is very uncertain, and it is usually assumed that one of the optically detected SSCs coincides with the supernebula. Using the Gaia Data Release 2 catalog, we improve the absolute astrometry of Hubble Space Telescope ultraviolet, optical, and infrared images by a factor of ∼10 and match them to the radio observations with an accuracy of 10–20 mas. We find that there are three SSCs at the center of NGC 5253. At optical wavelengths, the two SSCs lie on either side of the supernebula, which coincides with a highly obscured region. In the infrared, all three SSCs are seen with the supernebula dominating at the longest wavelengths. We examine the properties of the SSCs, which have ages of ∼1 Myr, are very compact ( pc), and are separated by projected distances of only 1.5 and 5.8 pc. It seems likely that they will merge and may form the building blocks for nuclear star clusters.

Recovering Age–Metallicity Distributions from Integrated Spectra: Validation with MUSE Data of a Nearby Nuclear Star Cluster

Abstract Current instruments and spectral analysis programs are now able to decompose the integrated spectrum of a stellar system into distributions of ages and metallicities. The reliability of these methods has rarely been tested on nearby systems with resolved stellar ages and metallicities. Here we derive the age–metallicity distribution of M54, the nucleus of the Sagittarius dwarf spheroidal galaxy, from its integrated Multi-Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE) spectrum. We find a dominant old (8–14 Gyr), metal-poor (−1.5 dex) component and a young (1 Gyr), metal-rich (+0.25 dex) component—consistent with the complex stellar populations measured from individual stars in the same MUSE data set. There is excellent agreement between the (mass-weighted) average age and metallicity of the resolved and integrated analyses. Differences are only 3% in age and 0.2 dex metallicity. By co-adding individual stars to create M54's integrated spectrum, we show that the recovered age–metallicity distribution is insensitive to the magnitude limit of the stars or the contribution of blue horizontal branch stars—even when including additional blue wavelength coverage from the WiFeS Atlas of Galactic Globular cluster Spectra survey. However, we find that the brightest stars can induce the spurious recovery of an old (>8 Gyr), metal-rich (+0.25 dex) stellar population, which is otherwise not expected from our understanding of chemical enrichment in M54. The overall derived stellar mass-to-light ratio of M54 is M/L V = 1.46 with a scatter of 0.22 across the field of view, which we attribute to the stochastic contribution of a young, metal-rich component. These findings provide strong evidence that complex stellar population distributions can be reliably recovered from integrated spectra of extragalactic systems.

The Next Generation Fornax Survey (NGFS): VII. A MUSE view of the nuclear star clusters in Fornax dwarf galaxies

ABSTRACT Clues to the formation and evolution of nuclear star clusters (NSCs) lie in their stellar populations. However, these structures are often very faint compared to their host galaxy, and spectroscopic analysis of NSCs is hampered by contamination of light from the rest of the system. With the introduction of wide-field integral field unit (IFU) spectrographs, new techniques have been developed to model the light from different components within galaxies, making it possible to cleanly extract the spectra of the NSCs and study their properties with minimal contamination from the light of the rest of the galaxy. This work presents the analysis of the NSCs in a sample of 12 dwarf galaxies in the Fornax Cluster observed with the Multi-Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE). Analysis of the stellar populations and star formation histories reveal that all the NSCs show evidence of multiple episodes of star formation, indicating that they have built up their mass further since their initial formation. The NSCs were found to have systematically lower metallicities than their host galaxies, which is consistent with a scenario for mass assembly through mergers with infalling globular clusters, whilst the presence of younger stellar populations and gas emission in the core of two galaxies is indicative of in-situ star formation. We conclude that the NSCs in these dwarf galaxies likely originated as globular clusters that migrated to the core of the galaxy that have built up their mass mainly through mergers with other infalling clusters, with gas-inflow leading to in-situ star formation playing a secondary role.

The Most Metal-poor Stars in Omega Centauri (NGC 5139)*

Abstract The most massive and complex globular clusters in the Galaxy are thought to have originated as the nuclear cores of now tidally disrupted dwarf galaxies, but the connection between globular clusters and dwarf galaxies is tenuous with the M54/Sagittarius system representing the only unambiguous link. The globular cluster Omega Centauri (ω Cen) is more massive and chemically diverse than M 54, and is thought to have been the nuclear star cluster of either the Sequoia or Gaia-Enceladus galaxy. Local Group dwarf galaxies with masses equivalent to these systems often host significant populations of very metal-poor stars ([Fe/H] < −2.5), and one might expect to find such objects in ω Cen. Using high-resolution spectra from Magellan-M2FS, we detected 11 stars in a targeted sample of 395 that have [Fe/H] ranging from −2.30 to −2.52. These are the most metal-poor stars discovered in the cluster, and are five times more metal-poor than ω Cen’s dominant population. However, these stars are not so metal-poor as to be unambiguously linked to a dwarf galaxy origin. The cluster’s metal-poor tail appears to contain two populations near [Fe/H] ∼ −2.1 and −2.4, which are very centrally concentrated but do not exhibit any peculiar kinematic signatures. Several possible origins for these stars are discussed.

Detailed Abundances in the Galactic Center: Evidence of a Metal-rich Alpha-enhanced Stellar Population

Abstract We present a detailed study of the composition of 20 M giants in the Galactic center with 15 of them confirmed to be in the nuclear star cluster. As a control sample we have also observed 7 M giants in the Milky Way disk with similar stellar parameters. All 27 stars are observed using the NIRSPEC spectrograph on the KECK II telescope in the K-band at a resolving power of R = 23,000. We report the first silicon abundance trends versus [Fe/H] for stars in the Galactic center. While finding a disk/bulge-like trend at subsolar metallicities, we find that [Si/Fe] is enhanced at supersolar metallicities. We speculate on possible enrichment scenarios to explain such a trend. However, the sample size is modest and the result needs to be confirmed by additional measurements of silicon and other α-elements. We also derive a new distribution of [Fe/H] and find the most metal-rich stars at [Fe/H] = +0.5 dex, confirming our earlier conclusions that the Galactic center hosts no stars with extreme chemical compositions.

Fingerprints of Binary Black Hole Formation Channels Encoded in the Mass and Spin of Merger Remnants

Abstract Binary black holes (BBHs) are thought to form in different environments, including the galactic field and (globular, nuclear, young, and open) star clusters. Here, we propose a method to estimate the fingerprints of the main BBH formation channels associated with these different environments. We show that the metallicity distribution of galaxies in the local universe along with the relative amount of mergers forming in the field or in star clusters determine the main properties of the BBH population. Our fiducial model predicts that the heaviest merger to date, GW170729, originated from a progenitor that underwent 2–3 merger events in a dense star cluster, possibly a galactic nucleus. The model predicts that at least one merger remnant out of a hundred BBH mergers in the local universe has mass , and one in a thousand can reach a mass as large as . Such massive black holes would bridge the gap between stellar-mass and intermediate-mass black holes. The relative number of low- and high-mass BBHs can help us unravel the fingerprints of different formation channels. Based on the assumptions of our model, we expect that isolated binaries are the main channel of BBH merger formation if of the whole BBH population has remnants with masses , whereas % of remnants having masses points to a significant subpopulation of dynamically formed BBH binaries.

Compact-object Mergers in the Galactic Center: Evolution in Triaxial Clusters

Abstract There is significant observational evidence that a large fraction of galactic centers, including those in the Milky Way and M31, host a supermassive black hole (SMBH) embedded in a triaxial nuclear star cluster. In this work, we study the secular orbital evolution of binaries in these environments and characterize the regions and morphological properties of nuclear star clusters that lead to gravitational wave mergers and/or tidal captures. We show that even a modest level of triaxiality in the density distribution of a cluster (an ellipsoid with axis ratios of 0.7 and 0.95) dramatically enhances the merger rates in the central parsecs of the Galaxy by a factor of up to ∼10–30 relative to a spherical density distribution. Moreover, we show that the merger fraction of binaries with semimajor axes in the range 10–100 au remains above 10% for the entire central parsec of the cluster, reaching values close to unity at a distance of ∼0.2–0.4 pc from the SMBH. We understand this large merger efficiency in terms of two distinct mechanisms: (i) eccentricity oscillations driven by the dominant axisymmetric part of the cluster potential that are enhanced by the slow modulation of a binary’s angular momentum from the triaxial contribution, similar to the well-known octupole-level dynamics in three-body systems; and (ii) chaotic diffusion of eccentricities arising when the nodal precession timescale of a binary’s orbit about the SMBH becomes comparable to its characteristic secular timescale. Overall, our results indicate that galactic centers are significantly more collisional than previously thought, with mergers taking place up to the effective radii of their nuclear star clusters.

Repeated gravitational lensing of gravitational waves in hierarchical black hole triples

We consider binary black holes (BBHs) in a hierarchical triple system where a more compact, less-massive binary is emitting detectable gravitational waves (GWs), and the tertiary is a supermassive BH at the center of a nuclear star cluster. As previous works have shown, the orbital motion of the outer binary can generate a detectable relativistic Doppler boost of the GWs emitted by the orbiting inner binary. We show here that for outer-binary orbits with a period of order one year, there can be a non-negligible probability for repeated gravitational lensing of the GWs emitted by the inner binary. Repeating gravitational lensing events could be detected by the LISA observatory as periodic GW amplitude spikes before the BBH enters the LIGO band. Such a detection would confirm the origin of some BBH mergers in nuclear star clusters. GW lensing also offers new testing grounds for strong gravity.