High-velocity runaway stars from three-body encounters

TL;DR

This study uses numerical simulations to explore how dynamical interactions between massive binaries and very massive stars in star clusters can produce high-velocity and hypervelocity stars, potentially explaining their origins.

Contribution

It demonstrates that encounters between tight massive binaries and very massive stars can generate high-velocity stars, providing a dynamical mechanism for their formation.

Findings

3-4% of encounters produce velocities ≥400 km/s

2% of encounters result in escape velocities exceeding the Milky Way's escape velocity

Encounters with single massive stars can also produce high-velocity and hypervelocity stars

Abstract

We performed numerical simulations of dynamical encounters between hard massive binaries and a very massive star (VMS; formed through runaway mergers of ordinary stars in the dense core of a young massive star cluster), in order to explore the hypothesis that this dynamical process could be responsible for the origin of high-velocity (\geq 200-400 km/s) early or late B-type stars. We estimated the typical velocities produced in encounters between very tight massive binaries and VMSs (of mass of \geq 200 Msun) and found that about 3-4 per cent of all encounters produce velocities of \geq 400 km/s, while in about 2 per cent of encounters the escapers attain velocities exceeding the Milky Ways's escape velocity. We therefore argue that the origin of high-velocity (\geq 200-400 km/s) runaway stars and at least some so-called hypervelocity stars could be associated with dynamical encounters between the tightest massive binaries and VMSs formed in the cores of star clusters. We also simulated dynamical encounters between tight massive binaries and single ordinary 50-100 Msun stars. We found that from 1 to \simeq 4 per cent of these encounters can produce runaway stars with velocities of \geq 300-400 km/s (typical of the bound population of high-velocity halo B-type stars) and occasionally (in less than 1 per cent of encounters) produce hypervelocity (\geq 700 km/s) late B-type escapers.