Stellar dynamics in young clusters: the formation of massive runaways and very massive runaway mergers

TL;DR

This paper combines N-body simulations with stellar evolution models to study the formation of very massive stars and runaways in young clusters, revealing limits on black hole masses and potential origins of massive runaways.

Contribution

It introduces a combined simulation approach to analyze runaway merging, massive star evolution, and the origins of massive runaways in dense stellar clusters.

Findings

Runaway merging can produce black holes up to 70 solar masses.

In low-metallicity clusters, runaway merging may lead to pair instability supernovae.

Massive runaways can originate from binary supernovae or dynamical interactions.

Abstract

In the present paper we combine an N-body code that simulates the dynamics of young dense stellar systems with a massive star evolution handler that accounts in a realistic way for the effects of stellar wind mass loss. We discuss two topics: 1. The formation and the evolution of very massive stars (with a mass >120 Mo) is followed in detail. These very massive stars are formed in the cluster core as a consequence of the successive (physical) collison of 10-20 most massive stars of the cluster (the process is known as runaway merging). The further evolution is governed by stellar wind mass loss during core hydrogen burning and during core helium burning (the WR phase of very massive stars). Our simulations reveal that as a consequence of runaway merging in clusters with solar and supersolar values, massive black holes can be formed but with a maximum mass of 70 Mo. In small metallicity clusters however, it cannot be excluded that the runaway merging process is responsible for pair instability supernovae or for the formation of intermediate mass black holes with a mass of several 100 Mo. 2. Massive runaways can be formed via the supernova explosion of one of the components in a binary (the Blaauw scenario) or via dynamical interaction of a single star and a binary or between two binaries in a star cluster. We explore the possibility that the most massive runaways (e.g., zeta Pup, lambda Cep, BD+433654) are the product of the collision and merger of 2 or 3 massive stars.