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mitosis
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Does anyone know, and is there an instrument that could?
Vanadium 50 said:We are indulging in that favorite PF activity "guess what the poster meant". Maybe we should let him or her tell us what he or she means.
phyzguy said:I disagree. The phrase "super massive black hole" has a well-defined astrophysical meaning. For example, Wikipedia says:
"A supermassive black hole (SMBH or sometimes SBH) is the largest type of black hole, containing a mass of the order of hundreds of thousands, to billions times, the mass of the Sun (M☉)."
mitosis said:but I thought I heard
I guess if you had to pick one range to measure it is logical to select the one to record the much more frequently occurring events. It still blows my mind that LIGO could be made to be sensitive enough to measure such small changes.Ibix said:Figure 3 in this paper suggests that LIGO isn't sensitive to signals from the inspiral of black holes above about 1000 solar masses (the chirp mass isn't the same as individual masses, but you get the idea). I think it's simply the frequency of the waves emitted by that size of binary black hole. Like any antenna, LIGO only works well for picking up waves in a limited range of frequencies.
I think that isn't quite the same issue. That article is proposing using an indirect detection - observing the effect of gravitational waves on the detected tick rate of distant pulsars. And they are proposing looking for much much longer times before the final inspiral - millions of years, not seconds. I don't think this methodology would have the sensitivity to pick up what LIGO looks for. On the other hand, I think it can detect enormously lower frequencies. Which is why they're looking at SMBHs (huge power output) early in the inspiral (enormous wavelength).jedishrfu said:Heres an article on it
https://www.simonsfoundation.org/2017/11/13/gravitational-waves-supermassive-black-hole-merger/
They say it happens too fast relative to what is detected today.
Thanks for solving IBEX!Ibix said:Figure 3 in this paper suggests that LIGO isn't sensitive to signals from the inspiral of black holes above about 1000 solar masses (the chirp mass isn't the same as individual masses, but you get the idea). I think it's simply the frequency of the waves emitted by that size of binary black hole. Like any antenna, LIGO only works well for picking up waves in a limited range of frequencies.
Super massive black holes are extremely massive and have a much lower frequency of collisions compared to smaller black holes. This means that the gravitational waves produced by these collisions have a lower frequency and are therefore harder to detect by LIGO's current sensitivity range.
Yes, LIGO is constantly being upgraded and improved to increase its sensitivity range. However, detecting collisions of super massive black holes would require a significant upgrade in terms of sensitivity and frequency range, which may not be feasible with current technology.
Yes, there are other methods and instruments being developed to detect gravitational waves from super massive black hole collisions. These include space-based detectors like LISA (Laser Interferometer Space Antenna) and pulsar timing arrays.
Scientists use other methods to indirectly observe the effects of super massive black hole collisions, such as studying the behavior of stars and gas around these black holes. They also use computer simulations to predict the gravitational waves that would be produced by these collisions.
It is possible that future advancements in technology and upgrades to LIGO could make it more sensitive to gravitational waves from super massive black hole collisions. However, it may still be a challenging task due to the extremely low frequency of these collisions.