Related papers: Intermediate Mass Black Hole Seeds from Cosmic Str…
The study of intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs) is a young and promising field of research. Formed by runaway collisions of massive stars in young and dense stellar clusters, intermediate-mass black holes could still be present in the…
In many theoretical scenarios it is expected that intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs, with masses M ~ 100-10000 solar masses) reside at the centers of some globular clusters. However, observational evidence for their existence is limited.…
In the standard picture of stellar evolution, pair-instability -- the energy loss in stellar cores due to electron-positron pair production -- is predicted to prevent the collapse of massive stars into black holes with mass in the range…
Intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs) occupy the $ 10^2 - 10^5\,M_\odot $ range, but their existence remains poorly constrained. Only a few candidates have been suggested in dwarf galaxies, globular clusters, and LIGO-Virgo-Kagra…
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has revealed a population of dense stellar systems at high redshift, including the "Cosmic Gems" arc ($z \sim 10.2$) and the "Firefly Sparkle" ($z \sim 8.3$). With masses in the range of $10^5$…
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…
We describe ongoing searches for intermediate-mass black holes with M_BH ~ 100-10^5 M_sun. We review a range of search mechanisms, both dynamical and those that rely on accretion signatures. We find that dynamical and accretion signatures…
The most massive black holes observed in the Universe weigh up to $\sim 10^{10} \, \mathrm{M_{\odot}}$, nearly independent of redshift. Reaching these final masses likely required copious accretion and several major mergers. Employing a…
Close encounters between two initially unbound objects can result in a binary system if enough energy is released as gravitational waves (GWs). We address the scenario in which such encounters occur in merging elliptical galaxies. There is…
Observations suggest that star clusters often form in binaries or larger bound groups. Therefore, mergers between two clusters are likely to occur. If these clusters both harbor an intermediate-mass black hole (IMBH; 10^{2-4} Msun) in their…
Intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs), with masses between roughly $10^2\,M_\odot$ and $10^5\,M_\odot$, represent a largely uncharted component of the black-hole (BH) population. They are theoretically predicted to form in several…
The process whereby the supermassive black holes populating the centers of galaxies have been assembled remains to be established, with the relative importance of seeds provided by collapsed Population-III stars, black holes formed in…
There is growing evidence that intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs), defined here as having a mass in the range M=500-10^5 Msun, are present in the dense centers of certain globular clusters (GCs). Gravitational waves (GWs) from their…
We use dynamical mass measurements of 16 black holes in transient low-mass X-ray binaries to infer the stellar black hole mass distribution in the parent population. We find that the observations are best described by a narrow mass…
Recent numerical simulations reveal that the isothermal collapse of pristine gas in atomic cooling haloes may result in stellar binaries of supermassive stars with $M_* \gtrsim 10^4\ \mathrm{M}_{\odot}$. For the first time, we compute the…
We explore the potential cumulative energy production of stellar mass black holes in early galaxies. Stellar mass black holes may accrete substantially from the higher density interstellar media of primordial galaxies, and their energy…
The fraction of cosmic string loops which collapse to form black holes is estimated using a set of realistic loops generated by loop fragmentation. The smallest radius sphere into which each cosmic string loop may fit is obtained by…
The observed scaling relations between supermassive black hole masses and their host galaxy properties indicate that supermassive black holes influence the evolution of galaxies. However, the scaling relations may be affected by selection…
We discuss the prospects for detecting faint intermediate-mass black holes, such as those predicted to exist in the cores of globular clusters and dwarf spheroidal galaxies. We briefly summarize the difficulties of stellar dynamical…
We perform fully relativistic simulations of the head-on collisions between intermediate-mass black holes and very massive stars. Such collisions are expected to occur in dense stellar clusters and may play an important role in growing the…