Dynamical friction on galactic center star clusters with an intermediate-mass black hole

Sungsoo S. Kim; Donald F. Figer; Mark Morris

doi:10.1086/422032

Dynamical friction on galactic center star clusters with an intermediate-mass black hole

Sungsoo S. Kim
, Donald F. Figer
, Mark Morris

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

76 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Numerical simulations of the dynamical friction suffered by a Galactic center star cluster harboring an intermediate-mass black hole (IMBH) have been performed. Gerhard has suggested that dynamical friction, which causes a cluster to lose orbital energy and spiral in toward the Galactic center, may explain the presence of a cluster of very young stars in the central parsec, where star formation might be prohibitively difficult because of strong tidal forces. However, numerical simulations by Kim & Morris showed that this is possible only if the cluster initially has an extremely dense core. Hansen & Milosavljević recently suggested that the presence of an IMBH in the cluster core might stabilize the core against tidal disruption during the inspirai through dynamical friction and thus might easily deliver young stars down to the central parsec. We find that the presence of an IMBH does lower the minimum initial core density required to transport young stars down to the central parsec, but this is possible only when the mass of the IMBH is at least ̃10% of the total cluster mass. This fraction is significantly higher than that estimated by Portegies Zwart & McMillan with numerical simulations of IMBH formation by successive merging of stars in the cluster core, so it does not appear that a realistic IMBH can help transport young stars into the central parsec.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	L123-L126
Journal	Astrophysical Journal
Volume	607
Issue number	2 II
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1086/422032
Publication status	Published - 1 Jun 2004

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
S. S. K. thanks Holger Baumgardt, Micol Christopher, Hyung Mok Lee, Stephen McMillan, Simon Portegies Zwart, and Nick Scoville for helpful discussion. This work was supported by the Astrophysical Research Center for the Structure and Evolution of the Cosmos (ARCSEC) of the Korea Science and Engineering Foundation through the Science Research Center program. Simulations presented in this Letter were performed on the Linux cluster at Korea Astronomy Observatory (KAO), which was built with the fund from KAO and ARCSEC. We are grateful to Jongsoo Kim for his kind assistance with the Linux cluster.

Keywords

Galaxies: star clusters
Galaxy: Kinematics and dynamics
Galaxy: center
Methods: N-body simulations
Stellar dynamics

Access to Document

10.1086/422032

Cite this

@article{52ffa432146e4de0b5d74f41f66a4a31,

title = "Dynamical friction on galactic center star clusters with an intermediate-mass black hole",

abstract = "Numerical simulations of the dynamical friction suffered by a Galactic center star cluster harboring an intermediate-mass black hole (IMBH) have been performed. Gerhard has suggested that dynamical friction, which causes a cluster to lose orbital energy and spiral in toward the Galactic center, may explain the presence of a cluster of very young stars in the central parsec, where star formation might be prohibitively difficult because of strong tidal forces. However, numerical simulations by Kim \& Morris showed that this is possible only if the cluster initially has an extremely dense core. Hansen \& Milosavljevi{\'c} recently suggested that the presence of an IMBH in the cluster core might stabilize the core against tidal disruption during the inspirai through dynamical friction and thus might easily deliver young stars down to the central parsec. We find that the presence of an IMBH does lower the minimum initial core density required to transport young stars down to the central parsec, but this is possible only when the mass of the IMBH is at least{\~ }10\% of the total cluster mass. This fraction is significantly higher than that estimated by Portegies Zwart \& McMillan with numerical simulations of IMBH formation by successive merging of stars in the cluster core, so it does not appear that a realistic IMBH can help transport young stars into the central parsec.",

keywords = "Galaxies: star clusters, Galaxy: Kinematics and dynamics, Galaxy: center, Methods: N-body simulations, Stellar dynamics",

author = "Kim, \{Sungsoo S.\} and Figer, \{Donald F.\} and Mark Morris",

note = "Funding Information: S. S. K. thanks Holger Baumgardt, Micol Christopher, Hyung Mok Lee, Stephen McMillan, Simon Portegies Zwart, and Nick Scoville for helpful discussion. This work was supported by the Astrophysical Research Center for the Structure and Evolution of the Cosmos (ARCSEC) of the Korea Science and Engineering Foundation through the Science Research Center program. Simulations presented in this Letter were performed on the Linux cluster at Korea Astronomy Observatory (KAO), which was built with the fund from KAO and ARCSEC. We are grateful to Jongsoo Kim for his kind assistance with the Linux cluster.",

year = "2004",

month = jun,

day = "1",

doi = "10.1086/422032",

language = "English",

volume = "607",

pages = "L123--L126",

journal = "Astrophysical Journal",

issn = "0004-637X",

publisher = "American Astronomical Society",

number = "2 II",

}

TY - JOUR

T1 - Dynamical friction on galactic center star clusters with an intermediate-mass black hole

AU - Kim, Sungsoo S.

AU - Figer, Donald F.

AU - Morris, Mark

N1 - Funding Information: S. S. K. thanks Holger Baumgardt, Micol Christopher, Hyung Mok Lee, Stephen McMillan, Simon Portegies Zwart, and Nick Scoville for helpful discussion. This work was supported by the Astrophysical Research Center for the Structure and Evolution of the Cosmos (ARCSEC) of the Korea Science and Engineering Foundation through the Science Research Center program. Simulations presented in this Letter were performed on the Linux cluster at Korea Astronomy Observatory (KAO), which was built with the fund from KAO and ARCSEC. We are grateful to Jongsoo Kim for his kind assistance with the Linux cluster.

PY - 2004/6/1

Y1 - 2004/6/1

N2 - Numerical simulations of the dynamical friction suffered by a Galactic center star cluster harboring an intermediate-mass black hole (IMBH) have been performed. Gerhard has suggested that dynamical friction, which causes a cluster to lose orbital energy and spiral in toward the Galactic center, may explain the presence of a cluster of very young stars in the central parsec, where star formation might be prohibitively difficult because of strong tidal forces. However, numerical simulations by Kim & Morris showed that this is possible only if the cluster initially has an extremely dense core. Hansen & Milosavljević recently suggested that the presence of an IMBH in the cluster core might stabilize the core against tidal disruption during the inspirai through dynamical friction and thus might easily deliver young stars down to the central parsec. We find that the presence of an IMBH does lower the minimum initial core density required to transport young stars down to the central parsec, but this is possible only when the mass of the IMBH is at least ̃10% of the total cluster mass. This fraction is significantly higher than that estimated by Portegies Zwart & McMillan with numerical simulations of IMBH formation by successive merging of stars in the cluster core, so it does not appear that a realistic IMBH can help transport young stars into the central parsec.

AB - Numerical simulations of the dynamical friction suffered by a Galactic center star cluster harboring an intermediate-mass black hole (IMBH) have been performed. Gerhard has suggested that dynamical friction, which causes a cluster to lose orbital energy and spiral in toward the Galactic center, may explain the presence of a cluster of very young stars in the central parsec, where star formation might be prohibitively difficult because of strong tidal forces. However, numerical simulations by Kim & Morris showed that this is possible only if the cluster initially has an extremely dense core. Hansen & Milosavljević recently suggested that the presence of an IMBH in the cluster core might stabilize the core against tidal disruption during the inspirai through dynamical friction and thus might easily deliver young stars down to the central parsec. We find that the presence of an IMBH does lower the minimum initial core density required to transport young stars down to the central parsec, but this is possible only when the mass of the IMBH is at least ̃10% of the total cluster mass. This fraction is significantly higher than that estimated by Portegies Zwart & McMillan with numerical simulations of IMBH formation by successive merging of stars in the cluster core, so it does not appear that a realistic IMBH can help transport young stars into the central parsec.

KW - Galaxies: star clusters

KW - Galaxy: Kinematics and dynamics

KW - Galaxy: center

KW - Methods: N-body simulations

KW - Stellar dynamics

UR - https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/3242689934

U2 - 10.1086/422032

DO - 10.1086/422032

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:3242689934

SN - 0004-637X

VL - 607

SP - L123-L126

JO - Astrophysical Journal

JF - Astrophysical Journal

IS - 2 II

ER -

Dynamical friction on galactic center star clusters with an intermediate-mass black hole

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Keywords

Access to Document

Other files and links

Fingerprint

Cite this