GW3 - Space and Third Generation GW Detectors |
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Speaker |
Mandel, Ilya |
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Co-autors |
Jonathan R. Gair, Alberto Sesana, Alberto Vecchio |
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Talk Title |
Probing light seeds of massive black holes with gravitational waves |
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Abstract |
Identifying the properties of the first generation of seeds of massive black holes is key to understanding the merger history and growth of galaxies. Mergers between ~100 solar-mass seed black holes generate gravitational waves in the 0.1--10 Hz band that lies between existing ground-based detectors (e.g., LIGO, Virgo, and GEO 600) and the planned space-based gravitational wave detector LISA. As such, these sources are targets for proposed third-generation ground-based instruments, such as the Einstein Telescope which is currently in design study. Using galaxy merger trees and four different models of black hole accretion --- which are meant to illustrate the potential of this new type of source rather than to yield precise event-rate predictions --- we find that such detectors could observe a few to a few tens of seed black-hole merger events in three years and provide, possibly unique, information on the evolution of structure in the corresponding era. We show further that a network of detectors may be able to measure the luminosity distance to sources to a precision of ~ 40%, allowing us to be confident of the high-redshift nature of the sources. |
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