Forecasting Tidal Disruption Events by Binary Black Hole Roulettes

TL;DR

This paper explores how gravitational wave observations of hierarchical triple black hole systems can predict tidal disruption events, enhancing detection strategies for future space-based observatories.

Contribution

It introduces a method to identify potential tidal disruption events in BBH mergers using LISA data, considering the effects of tertiary companions and orbital alignments.

Findings

TDE probability is higher in aligned orbital and spin configurations.

LISA can examine parameters of over 1000 BBHs for TDE predictions.

Tertiary parameters influence the likelihood of tidal disruptions.

Abstract

We discuss the gravitational wave emission and the orbital evolution of a hierarchical triple system composed of an inner binary black hole (BBH) and an outer tertiary. Depending on the kick velocity at the merger, the merged BBH could tidally disrupt the tertiary. Even though the fraction of BBH mergers accompanied by such disruptions is expected to be much smaller than unity, the existence of a tertiary and its basic parameters (e.g. semimajor axis, projected mass) can be examined for more than 1000 BBHs with the space GW detector LISA and its follow-on missions. This allows us to efficiently prescreen the targets for the follow-up searches for the tidal disruption events (TDEs). The TDE probability would be significantly higher for triple systems with aligned orbital- and spin-angular momenta, compared with random configurations.