Revised Rates of Stellar Disruption in Galactic Nuclei
Astrophysics
2009-11-07 v2
Abstract
We compute rates of tidal disruption of stars by supermassive black holes in galactic nuclei, using downwardly-revised black hole masses from the M-sigma relation. In galaxies with steep nuclear density profiles, which dominate the overall event rate, the disruption frequency varies inversely with assumed black hole mass. We compute a total rate for non-dwarf galaxies that is about a factor ten higher than in earlier studies. Disruption rates are predicted to be highest in nucleated dwarf galaxies, assuming that such galaxies contain black holes. Monitoring of a rich galaxy cluster for a few years could rule out the existence of intermediate mass black holes in dwarf galaxies.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.astro-ph/0305493,
title = {Revised Rates of Stellar Disruption in Galactic Nuclei},
author = {Jianxiang Wang and David Merritt},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:astro-ph/0305493},
year = {2009}
}
Comments
11 pages, 9 figures, uses emulateapj.sty