Giant outbursts of Be/X-ray binaries may occur when a Be-star disc undergoes strong eccentricity growth due to the Kozai-Lidov (KL) mechanism. The KL effect acts on a disc that is highly inclined to the binary orbital plane provided that the disc aspect ratio is sufficiently small. The eccentric disc overflows its Roche lobe and material flows from the Be star disc over to the companion neutron star causing X-ray activity. With N-body simulations and steady state decretion disc models we explore system parameters for which a disc in the Be/X-ray binary 4U 0115+634 is KL unstable and the resulting timescale for the oscillations. We find good agreement between predictions of the model and the observed giant outburst timescale provided that the disc is not completely destroyed by the outburst. This allows the outer disc to be replenished between outbursts and a sufficiently short KL oscillation timescale. An initially eccentric disc has a shorter KL oscillation timescale compared to an initially circular orbit disc. We suggest that the chaotic nature of the outbursts is caused by the sensitivity of the mechanism to the distribution of material within the disc. The outbursts continue provided that the Be star supplies material that is sufficiently misaligned to the binary orbital plane. We generalise our results to Be/X-ray binaries with varying orbital period and find that if the Be star disc is flared, it is more likely to be unstable to KL oscillations in a smaller orbital period binary, in agreement with observations.
A third object in the vicinity of a binary system causes variations in the eccentricity and the inclination of the binary through the Kozai-Lidov effect. We examine if such variations leave a detectable imprint on the gravitational waves of a binary consisting of intermediate mass black holes and stellar mass objects. As a proof of concept, we present an example where LISA may detect the Kozai-Lidov modulated gravitational wave signals of such sources from at least a distance of 1Mpc if the perturbation is caused by a supermassive black hole tertiary. Although the quick pericenter precession i…
We use three dimensional hydrodynamical simulations to show that a highly misaligned accretion disk around one component of a binary system can exhibit global Kozai-Lidov cycles, where the inclination and eccentricity of the disk are interchanged periodically. This has important implications for accreting systems on all scales, for example, the formation of planets and satellites in circumstellar and circumplanetary disks, outbursts in X-ray binary systems and accretion on to supermassive black holes.
We show that a black-hole binary with an external companion can undergo Lidov-Kozai cycles that cause a close pericenter passage, leading to a rapid merger due to gravitational-wave emission. This scenario occurs most often for systems in which the companion has mass comparable to the reduced mass of the binary and the companion orbit has semi-major axis within a factor of $\sim 10$ of the binary semi-major axis. Using a simple population-synthesis model and 3-body simulations, we estimate the rate of mergers in triple black hole systems in the field to be about six per Gpc$^3$ per year in the…
Nuclear star clusters around massive black holes are expected to be abundant in stellar mass black holes and black hole binaries. These binaries form a hierarchical triple system with the massive black hole at the center. Gravitational perturbations from the massive black hole can cause high eccentricity excitation. During this process, the eccentricity may approach unity, and the pericenter distance may become sufficiently small that gravitational wave emission drives the binary to merge. In this paper, we consider a simple proof of concept and explore the effect of the eccentric Kozai-Lidov …
Neutron stars are likely surrounded by gas, debris, and asteroid belts. Kozai-Lidov perturbations, induced by a distant, but gravitationally bound companion, can trigger the infall of such orbiting bodies onto a central compact object. These effects could lead to the emission of fast radio bursts (FRBs), for example by asteroid-induced magnetic wake fields in the wind of the compact object. A few percent of binary neutron star systems in the Universe, such as neutron star-main sequence star, neutron star-white dwarf, double neutron star, and neutron star-black hole systems, can account for the…
A promising channel for producing binary black hole mergers is the Lidov-Kozai orbital resonance in hierarchical triple systems. While this mechanism has been studied in isolation, the distribution of such mergers in time and across star-forming environments is not well characterized. In this work, we explore Lidov-Kozai-induced black hole mergers in open clusters, combining semi-analytic and Monte Carlo methods to calculate merger rates and delay times for eight different population models. We predict a merger rate density of $\sim$1--10\,Gpc$^{-3}$\,yr$^{-1}$ for the Lidov-Kozai channel in t…
Gravitational wave (GW) emissions from extreme-mass-ratio inspirals (EMRIs) are promising sources for low-frequency GW-detectors. They result from a compact object, such as a stellar-mass black-hole (BH), captured by a supermassive black hole (SMBH). Several physical processes have been proposed to form EMRIs. In particular, weak two-body interactions over a long time scale (i.e., relaxation processes) have been proposed as a likely mechanism to drive the BH orbit to high eccentricity. Consequently, it is captured by the SMBH and becomes an EMRI. Here we demonstrate that EMRIs are naturally fo…
The tidal force from a third body near a binary system could introduce long-term oscillations in the binary's eccentricity, known as Kozai-Lidov oscillations. We show that the Kozai-Lidov oscillations of stellar-mass black hole binaries have the potential to be observed by LISA. Detections of such binaries will give insights into binary formation channels and also provide an important benchmark of observing Kozai-Lidov oscillations directly.
Dynamical scattering of binaries and triple systems of stars, planets, and compact objects may produce highly inclined triple systems subject to Kozai-Lidov (KL) oscillations, potentially leading to collisions, mergers, Type Ia supernovae, and other phenomena. We present the results of more than 400 million gravitational scattering experiments of binary-binary, triple-single, and triple-binary scattering. We compute the cross sections for all possible outcomes and explore their dependencies on incoming velocity, mass, semi-major axis, and eccentricity, including analytic fits and discussion of…
Mergers of compact object binaries are one of the most powerful sources of gravitational waves (GWs) in the frequency range of second-generation ground-based gravitational wave detectors (Advanced LIGO and Virgo). Dynamical simulations of young dense star clusters (SCs) indicate that ~27 per cent of all double compact object binaries are members of hierarchical triple systems (HTs). In this paper, we consider 570 HTs composed of three compact objects (black holes or neutron stars) that formed dynamically in N-body simulations of young dense SCs. We simulate them for a Hubble time with a new co…
We explore the effects of long term secular perturbations on the distribution of dark matter particles around Supermassive Black Hole (BH) binaries. We show that in the hierarchical (in separation) three-body problem, one of the BHs and a dark matter particle form an inner binary. Gravitational perturbations from the BH companion, on a much wider orbit, can cause the dark matter particle to reach extremely high eccentricities and even get accreted onto the BH, by what is known as the Eccentric Kozai-Lidov (EKL) mechanism. We show that this may produce a torus-like configuration for the dark ma…
In order to understand the rate of merger of stellar-mass black hole binaries (BHBs) by gravitational wave (GW) emission it is important to determine the major pathways to merger. We use numerical simulations to explore the evolution of BHBs inside the radius of influence of supermassive black holes (SMBHs) in galactic centers. In this region the evolution of binaries is dominated by perturbations from the central SMBH. In particular, as first pointed out by Antonini and Perets, the Kozai-Lidov (KL) mechanism trades relative inclination of the BHB to the SMBH for eccentricity of the BHB, and f…
We study the spin and eccentricity evolution of black-hole (BH) binaries that are perturbed by tertiary masses and experience the Lidov-Kozai (LK) excitation. We focus on three aspects. Firstly, we study the spin-orbit alignment of the inner binary following the approach outlined by Antonini et al. [MNRAS 480, L58 (2018)] and Liu and Lai [ApJ 863, 68 (2018)], yet allowing the spins to have random initial orientations. We confirm the existence of a dynamical attractor that drives the spin-orbit angle at the end of the LK evolution to a value given by the initial angle between the spin and the o…
An Enhanced Formation Channel for Galactic Dual-Line Gravitational-Wave Sources: von Zeipel-Lidov-Kozai Effect in Triples Involving Sgr A*
Kavli Institute for Astronomy and Astrophysics, Peking University（北京大学科维理天文与天体物理研究所）；School of Fundamental Physics and Mathematical Sciences, Hangzhou Institute for Advanced Study, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences（中国科学院大学杭州高等研究院基础物理与数学学院）；School of Physical Sciences, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences（中国科学院大学物理科学学院）；Institute of Fundamental Physics and Quantum Technology, Ningbo University（宁波大学基础物理与量子技术研究所）；School of Physical Science and Technology, Ningbo University（宁波大学物理科学与技术学院）；Department of Astronomy, School of Physics, Peking University（北京大学物理学院天文学系）；Institute for Astronomy, School of Physics, Zhejiang University（浙江大学物理学院天体物理研究所）；National Astronomical Observatories, Chinese Academy of Sciences（中国科学院国家天文台）
In the last 10 years, since its last giant outburst in 2006, regular X-ray outbursts (type I) were detected every periastron passage in the Be X-ray binary EXO 2030+375. Recently, however, it was reported that the source started to show a peculiar behavior: its X-ray flux decreased significantly and type I outbursts were missed in several cases. At the same time, the spin frequency of the neutron star, which had been increasing steadily since the end of the 2006 giant outburst, reached a plateau. Very recent observations indicate that the source is now starting to spin down. These observed phe…
Recent theoretical studies suggest that stellar-mass binary black holes (BBHs) would merge more efficiently due to the Kozai-Lidov mechanism if these binaries form in the vicinity of supermassive black holes (SMBHs). Since SMBHs are likely rotating rapidly, we continue our earlier study on the generalization of the Kozai-Lidov formalism to include the spin of the SMBH and study the evolution of a nearby BBH. We find that the eccentricity and orbital inclination of the BBH is significantly affected, because the spin (i) forces the orbital plane of the center-of-mass of the BBH around the SMBH t…
Type I Be/X-ray binary outbursts are driven by mass transfer from a Be star decretion disc to a neutron star companion during each orbital period. Treiber et al. (2021) recently observed non-periodic type I outbursts in RX J0529.8-6556 that has unknown binary orbital properties. We show that non-periodic type I outbursts may be temporarily driven in a low eccentricity binary with a disc that is inclined sufficiently to be mildly unstable to Kozai-Lidov oscillations. The inclined disc becomes eccentric and material is transferred to the neutron star at up to three locations in each orbit: when …
Be star X-ray binaries are transient systems that show two different types of outbursts. Type I outbursts occur each orbital period while type II outbursts have a period and duration that are not related to any periodicity of the binary system. Type II outbursts may be caused by mass transfer to the neutron star from a highly eccentric Be star disk. A sufficiently misaligned Be star decretion disk undergoes secular Von Zeipel-Lidov-Kozai (ZLK) oscillations of eccentricity and inclination. Observations show that in some systems the type II outbursts come in pairs with the second being of lower …
We study the effect of external companion on the orbital and spin evolution of merging black-hole (BH) binaries. An sufficiently close by and inclined companion can excite Lidov-Kozai (LK) eccentricity oscillations in the binary, thereby shortening its merger time. During such LK-enhanced orbital decay, the spin axis of the BH generally exhibits chaotic evolution, leading to a wide range ($0^\circ$-$180^\circ$) of final spin-orbit misalignment angle from an initially aligned configuration. For systems that do not experience eccentricity excitation, only modest ($\lesssim 20^\circ$) spin-orbit …
The Milky Way and a significant fraction of galaxies are observed to host a central Massive Black Hole (MBH) embedded in a non-spherical nuclear star cluster. We study the secular orbital evolution of compact-object binaries in these environments and characterize the excitation of extremely large eccentricities that can lead to mergers by gravitational radiation. We find that the eccentricity excitation occurs most efficiently when the nodal precession timescale of the binary's orbit around the MBH due to the non-spherical cluster becomes comparable (within a factor of ~10) to the timescale on…
Black hole (BH) mergers driven by gravitational perturbations of external companions constitute an important class of formation channels for merging BH binaries detected by LIGO. We have studied the orbital and spin evolution of binary BHs in triple systems, where the tertiary companion excites large eccentricity in the inner binary through Lidov-Kozai oscillations, causing the binary to merge via gravitational radiation. Using the single-orbital-averaged and double-orbital-averaged secular dynamics equations of triples, we determine the merger window (the range of companion inclinations that …
A significant fraction of stars are members of gravitationally bound hierarchies containing three or more components. Almost all low mass stars in binaries with periods shorter three days are part of a hierarchical system. We therefore anticipate that a large fraction of compact galactic binaries detected by the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) will be members of hierarchical triple or quadruple system. The acceleration imparted by the hierarchical companions can be detected in the gravitational wave signal for outer periods as large as 100 years. For systems with periods that are sho…
High-density cusps of compact remnants are expected to form around supermassive black holes (SMBHs) in galactic nuclei via dynamical friction and two-body relaxation. Due to the high density, binaries in orbit around the SMBH can frequently undergo close encounters with compact remnants from the cusp. This can affect the gravitational wave merger rate of compact binaries in galactic nuclei. We investigated this process by means of high accuracy few-body simulations, performed with a novel Monte Carlo approach. We find that, around a SgrA*-like SMBH, three-body encounters increase the number of…
We study the dynamics of merging compact binaries near a rotating supermassive black hole (SMBH) in a hierarchical triple configuration. We include various general relativistic effects that couple the inner orbit, the outer orbit and the spin of the SMBH. During the orbital decay due to gravitational radiation, the inner binary can encounter an "apsidal precession resonance" and experience eccentricity excitation. This resonance occurs when the apsidal precession rate of the inner binary matches that of the outer binary, with the precessions driven by both Newtonian interactions and various po…
Mechanisms have been proposed to enhance the merger rate of stellar mass black hole binaries, such as the Von Zeipel-Lidov-Kozai mechanism (vZLK). However, high inclinations are required in order to greatly excite the eccentricity and to reduce the merger time through vZLK. Here, we propose a novel pathway through which compact binaries could merge due to eccentricity increase in general, including in a near coplanar configuration. Specifically, a compact binary migrating in an AGN disk could be captured in an evection resonance, when the precession rate of the binary equals their orbital peri…
At least $70\%$ of massive OBA-type stars reside in binary or higher-order systems. The dynamical evolution of these systems can lend insight into the origins of extreme phenomena such as X-ray binaries and gravitational wave sources. In one such dynamical process, the Eccentric Kozai-Lidov (EKL) Mechanism, a third companion star alters the secular evolution of a binary system. For dynamical stability, these triple systems must have a hierarchical configuration. We explore the effects of a distant third companion's gravitational perturbations on a massive binary's orbital configuration before …
Pleione is a Be star that is in a 218 day orbit with a low-mass binary companion. Recent numerical simulations have shown that a Be star disc can be subject to breaking when material is actively being fed into the inner parts of the disc. After breaking, the disc is composed of two rings: an inner ring that is anchored to the stellar equator and an outer ring that is free to nodally precess. A double ring disc may explain some of the observed variability in Pleione. We model the nodal precession of the outer disc ring that is driven by the companion on an observed timescale of $80.5\,\rm yr$. …
