Gravitational waves hint at black holes born from failed supernovae
A Caltech-led study using LIGO, Virgo, KAGRA data suggests a distinct population of black holes formed from stars that collapsed without exploding.
Data reveals mass distribution gap
Over the last 10 years, the LIGO, Virgo, KAGRA network detected 257 black hole mergers whose masses were analyzed by researchers. The data revealed a dramatic peak at 10 solar masses, which accounts for three-quarters of the entire sample of mergers. In an unprecedented discovery, researchers observed no black holes between 12 and 16 solar masses. This gap indicates that some massive stars may die without a bang instead of detonating in fiery supernovae.
Spin rates suggest shared origin
Scientists also examined the distribution of spin rates for those black holes to determine if they share a common origin. Katerina Chatziioannou, a professor of physics at Caltech and William H. Hurt Scholar, stated that most merging black holes are about 10 times the mass of our sun. These latest results indicate that this group could represent a unique subpopulation which did not undergo a supernova explosion. These results represent a connection between gravitational-wave data and underlying astrophysics researchers are trying to extract.
Study published in Physical Review D
Isaac Legred, a postdoc at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, served as the lead author on this research. Former lab member Jacob Golomb, now at Asari AI, is also an author on the paper. The study has been published in the journal Physical Review D following analysis by the Caltech team. Previous observations had proposed that large populations of black holes may represent failed supernovae before this confirmation.
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