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Blue Large-Amplitude Pulsators as Tracers for Hypervelocity Stellar Mass Black Holes

AJAS · 2020 Physics and Astronomy (inferred)

Tovi Sonnenberg · New York Academy of Sciences, The

Overview

Blue large-amplitude pulsators (BLAPs) were discovered in 2017 and recognized as an extraordinarily rare group of variably and thermally homogeneous stars. BLAPs appear to have lost a very significant fraction of the stellar mass, and the process responsible is still unknown. Empirically derived parameters of luminosity, radius, and mass have not heretofore been achieved because BLAPs reside at previously unknown distances. In this study, I present the use of Gaia DR2 for determining these parameters, and I discuss the implications those have on the formerly proposed common envelope (CE) origin of BLAPs. I found that BLAPs’ masses are highly inconsistent with the nuclear stages of CEs and that the varied mean luminosities of BLAPs produce HR diagram positions that are non-adherent to the evolutionary tracks of CEs. Both of those observations suggest different mass loss quantities. Furthermore, preliminary galactic mapping of BLAPs revealed that the majority of BLAPs occupy nearly identical galactocentric y coordinates; they are in a line extending outwards from the center of the galaxy. Such a linear distribution hints at an external factor (not local to the stellar system) in the mass loss of BLAPs. I propose that a hypervelocity stellar-mass black hole—ejected from the black hole cluster in the central parsec of the galaxy—interacted with globular cluster stars in partial tidal disruption events. The nearly identical proper motions of BLAPs I found in Gaia DR2 support this hypothesis.

Competition history

  • AJAS 2020 Category not listed

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Source: AAAS Annual Meeting (Confex) / American Junior Academy of Science

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