Related papers: Binary black hole growth by gas accretion in stell…
Primordial black holes (PBH) accretion in the late Universe can lead to significant mass growth. A larger mass further accelerates the accretion radiation output for PBHs with initial masses greater than one solar mass, potentially leading…
Recent observations and stellar dynamics simulations suggest that thousand solar mass black holes can form in compact massive young star clusters. Any such clusters in the bulge of their host galaxy will spiral to the center within a few…
It is widely believed that the spin of black holes in X-ray binaries is mainly natal. A significant spin-up from accretion is not possible. If the secondary has a low mass, the black hole spin cannot change too much even if the black hole…
The dynamical formation of stellar-mass black hole-black hole binaries has long been a promising source of gravitational waves for the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO). Mass segregation, gravitational focusing, and…
Scalar fields of masses between $10^{-21}\rm{eV}/c^2$ and $10^{-11} \rm{eV}/c^2$ can exhibit enhanced gravitational interactions with black holes, and form scalar clouds around them. Such a cloud modifies the dynamics of a coalescing…
In binary black-hole mergers from isolated binary-star evolution, both black holes are from progenitor stars that have lost their hydrogen-rich envelopes by binary mass transfer. Envelope stripping is known to affect the pre-supernova core…
Mass accretion by black holes (BHs) is typically capped at the Eddington rate, when radiation's push balances gravity's pull. However, even exponential growth at the Eddington-limited e-folding time t_E ~ few x 0.01 billion years, is too…
All stellar mass black holes have hitherto been identified by X-rays emitted by gas that is accreting onto the black hole from a companion star. These systems are all binaries with black holes below 30 M$_{\odot}$$^{1-4}$. Theory predicts,…
The first stars in the universe, forming at redshifts z>15 in minihalos with masses of order 10^6 Msun, may leave behind black holes as their remnants. These objects could conceivably serve as "seeds" for much larger black holes observed at…
The formation of massive stars in close binary systems is complicated due to their high radiation pressure, the crowded environment and the expected minimum separation for fragmentation being many times greater than the orbital separation.…
We review the state of the evidence for the existence and observational appearance of supermassive black hole binaries. Such objects are expected from standard hierarchical galaxy evolution to form after two galaxies, each containing a…
We argue that supermassive black hole growth in AGN occurs via sequences of randomly--oriented accretion discs with angular momentum limited by self--gravity. These stably co-- or counter--align with the black hole spin with almost equal…
We consider the evolution of a supermassive black hole binary (SMBHB) surrounded by a retrograde accretion disk. Assuming the disk is exactly in the binary plane and transfers energy and angular momentum to the binary via direct gas…
We compute the isotropic gravitational wave (GW) background produced by binary supermassive black holes (SBHs) in galactic nuclei. In our model, massive binaries evolve at early times via gravitational-slingshot interaction with nearby…
Neutron stars inspiralling into a stellar envelope can accrete at rates vastly exceeding the Eddington limit if the flow develops pressures high enough to allow neutrinos to radiate the released gravitational energy. It has been suggested…
Theory and observations suggest that single-star evolution is not able to produce black holes (BHs) with masses in the range $3-5M_{\odot}$ and above $\sim 45M_{\odot}$, referred to as the lower mass gap (LMG) and the upper mas gap (UMG),…
Supermassive black holes are prevalent at the centers of massive galaxies, and their masses scale with galaxy properties, increasing evidence suggesting that these trends continue to low stellar masses. Seeds are needed for supermassive…
The origin of the supermassive black holes that power the most distant quasars observed is largely unknown. One hypothesis is that they grew rapidly from intermediate-mass seeds (~100 M_sun) left by the first stars. However, some previous…
The population of binary black hole mergers observed in gravitational waves, together with astrophysical simulations, can help us to understand the properties of the progenitors and the binary formation mechanisms in different astrophysical…
Making use of a new N-body model to describe the evolution of a moderate-size globular cluster we investigate the characteristics of the population of black holes within such a cluster. This model reaches core-collapse and achieves a peak…