Rates of Stellar Tidal Disruption Events around Intermediate-mass Black Holes
Rates of stellar tidal disruption events (TDEs) around supermassive black holes (SMBHs) have been extensively calculated using the loss cone theory, while theoretical work on TDE rates around intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs) has been lacking. In this work, we aim to accurately calculate the IMB...
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IOP Publishing
2025-01-01
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| Series: | The Astrophysical Journal Letters |
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| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/adace7 |
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| author | Janet N. Y. Chang Lixin Dai Hugo Pfister Rudrani Kar Chowdhury Priyamvada Natarajan |
| author_facet | Janet N. Y. Chang Lixin Dai Hugo Pfister Rudrani Kar Chowdhury Priyamvada Natarajan |
| author_sort | Janet N. Y. Chang |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Rates of stellar tidal disruption events (TDEs) around supermassive black holes (SMBHs) have been extensively calculated using the loss cone theory, while theoretical work on TDE rates around intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs) has been lacking. In this work, we aim to accurately calculate the IMBH TDE rates based on their black hole (BH) masses and the stellar profiles of their host galaxies obtained from the latest observations. We find that the TDE rate per galaxy for IMBHs in the center of small galaxies is similar to that of SMBH TDEs, while the TDE rate per cluster from IMBHs in globular clusters is much lower. Very interestingly, we show that the rate of IMBH TDEs generally increases with the BH mass, which is opposite to the trend seen in SMBH TDEs. As a result, the volumetric TDE rate peaks around a BH mass of 10 ^6 M _⊙ . The IMBH TDEs from galactic nuclei have an overall volumetric rate comparable to SMBH TDEs at ∼10 ^−7 Mpc ^−3 yr ^−1 , and off-center IMBH TDEs from globular clusters have a volumetric rate that is one or two orders of magnitude lower, assuming that their occupation fraction varies within 10%–100%. Furthermore, we report that IMBH TDEs typically occur in the pinhole regime, which means that deeply plunging events are more likely for IMBH TDEs compared to SMBH TDEs. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-944b0d3d68b24b0aa56211446bb26a38 |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 2041-8205 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-01-01 |
| publisher | IOP Publishing |
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| series | The Astrophysical Journal Letters |
| spelling | doaj-art-944b0d3d68b24b0aa56211446bb26a382025-02-11T14:04:14ZengIOP PublishingThe Astrophysical Journal Letters2041-82052025-01-019802L2210.3847/2041-8213/adace7Rates of Stellar Tidal Disruption Events around Intermediate-mass Black HolesJanet N. Y. Chang0https://orcid.org/0009-0004-2575-1924Lixin Dai1https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9589-5235Hugo Pfister2https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0841-5182Rudrani Kar Chowdhury3https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2694-933XPriyamvada Natarajan4https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5554-8896Department of Physics, The University of Hong Kong , Pokfulam Road, Hong Kong ; lixindai@hku.hkDepartment of Physics, The University of Hong Kong , Pokfulam Road, Hong Kong ; lixindai@hku.hkDepartment of Physics, The University of Hong Kong , Pokfulam Road, Hong Kong ; lixindai@hku.hkDepartment of Physics, The University of Hong Kong , Pokfulam Road, Hong Kong ; lixindai@hku.hkDepartment of Astronomy, Yale University , New Haven, CT 06511, USA; Department of Physics, Yale University , New Haven, CT 06520, USA; Black Hole Initiative at Harvard University , 20 Garden St., Cambridge, MA 02138, USARates of stellar tidal disruption events (TDEs) around supermassive black holes (SMBHs) have been extensively calculated using the loss cone theory, while theoretical work on TDE rates around intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs) has been lacking. In this work, we aim to accurately calculate the IMBH TDE rates based on their black hole (BH) masses and the stellar profiles of their host galaxies obtained from the latest observations. We find that the TDE rate per galaxy for IMBHs in the center of small galaxies is similar to that of SMBH TDEs, while the TDE rate per cluster from IMBHs in globular clusters is much lower. Very interestingly, we show that the rate of IMBH TDEs generally increases with the BH mass, which is opposite to the trend seen in SMBH TDEs. As a result, the volumetric TDE rate peaks around a BH mass of 10 ^6 M _⊙ . The IMBH TDEs from galactic nuclei have an overall volumetric rate comparable to SMBH TDEs at ∼10 ^−7 Mpc ^−3 yr ^−1 , and off-center IMBH TDEs from globular clusters have a volumetric rate that is one or two orders of magnitude lower, assuming that their occupation fraction varies within 10%–100%. Furthermore, we report that IMBH TDEs typically occur in the pinhole regime, which means that deeply plunging events are more likely for IMBH TDEs compared to SMBH TDEs.https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/adace7Tidal disruptionIntermediate-mass black holesGalactic centerGlobular star clustersStellar dynamics |
| spellingShingle | Janet N. Y. Chang Lixin Dai Hugo Pfister Rudrani Kar Chowdhury Priyamvada Natarajan Rates of Stellar Tidal Disruption Events around Intermediate-mass Black Holes The Astrophysical Journal Letters Tidal disruption Intermediate-mass black holes Galactic center Globular star clusters Stellar dynamics |
| title | Rates of Stellar Tidal Disruption Events around Intermediate-mass Black Holes |
| title_full | Rates of Stellar Tidal Disruption Events around Intermediate-mass Black Holes |
| title_fullStr | Rates of Stellar Tidal Disruption Events around Intermediate-mass Black Holes |
| title_full_unstemmed | Rates of Stellar Tidal Disruption Events around Intermediate-mass Black Holes |
| title_short | Rates of Stellar Tidal Disruption Events around Intermediate-mass Black Holes |
| title_sort | rates of stellar tidal disruption events around intermediate mass black holes |
| topic | Tidal disruption Intermediate-mass black holes Galactic center Globular star clusters Stellar dynamics |
| url | https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/adace7 |
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