Supermassive black hole feedback quenches disc galaxies and suppresses bar formation in TNG50

TL;DR

This study uses the TNG50 simulation to show that supermassive black hole feedback can quench star formation and prevent bar formation in disc galaxies by ejecting central gas, revealing a link between black hole activity and galaxy morphology.

Contribution

It demonstrates how black hole feedback influences gas distribution and bar formation in Milky Way-like galaxies within a cosmological simulation.

Findings

Black hole feedback creates central gas holes in barred galaxies.

Barred galaxies tend to host rapidly growing supermassive black holes.

Black hole-driven feedback suppresses star formation and inhibits future bar formation.

Abstract

We use the cosmological magneto-hydrodynamical simulation TNG50 to study the relationship between black hole feedback, the presence of stellar bars, and star formation quenching in Milky Way-like disc galaxies. Of our sample of 198 discs, about 63 per cent develop stellar bars that last until z=0. After the formation of their bars, the majority of these galaxies develop persistent 3-15 kpc wide holes in the centres of their gas discs. Tracking their evolution from z=4 to 0, we demonstrate that barred galaxies tend to form within dark matter haloes that become centrally disc dominated early on (and are thus unstable to bar formation) whereas unbarred galaxies do not; barred galaxies also host central black holes that grow more rapidly than those of unbarred galaxies. As a result, most barred galaxies eventually experience kinetic wind feedback that operates when the mass of the central supermassive black hole exceeds $M_{BH} > 10^8 M_{\odot}$. This feedback ejects gas from the central disc into the circumgalactic medium and rapidly quenches barred galaxies of their central star formation. If kinetic black hole feedback occurs in an unbarred disc it suppresses subsequent star formation and inhibits its growth, stabilising the disc against future bar formation. Consequently, most barred galaxies develop black hole-driven gas holes, though a gas hole alone does not guarantee the presence of a stellar bar. This subtle relationship between black hole feedback, cold gas disc morphology, and stellar bars may provide constraints on subgrid physics models for supermassive black hole feedback.