Papers › The minimum and maximum gravitational-wave background from supermassive binary black holes
The minimum and maximum gravitational-wave background from supermassive binary black holes
Xing-Jiang Zhu, Weiguang Cui, Eric Thrane
The archive published only this paper's code-link row. Authors, date and abstract are from arXiv's metadata (CC0), read from the Kaggle arXiv metadata snapshot of 2026-09-12 where its title matched the archive's; the title is the archive's.
The gravitational-wave background from supermassive binary black holes (SMBBHs) has yet to be detected. This has led to speculations as to whether current pulsar timing array limits are in tension with theoretical predictions. In this paper, we use electromagnetic observations to constrain the SMBBH background from above and below. To derive the {\em maximum} amplitude of the background, we suppose that equal-mass SMBBH mergers fully account for the local black hole number density. This yields a maximum characteristic signal amplitude at a period of one year A_(yr)<2.4×10⁻¹⁵, which is comparable to the pulsar timing limits. To derive the {\em minimum} amplitude requires an electromagnetic observation of an SMBBH. While a number of candidates have been put forward, there are no universally-accepted electromagnetic detections in the nanohertz band. We show the candidate 3C 66B implies a lower limit, which is inconsistent with limits from pulsar timing, casting doubt on its binary nature. Alternatively, if the parameters of OJ 287 are known accurately, then A_(yr)> 6.1×10⁻¹⁷ at 95\% confidence level. If one of the current candidates can be established as a bona fide SMBBH, it will immediately imply an astrophysically interesting lower limit.
Code
Repository list and official/mentioned flags are the archive's, frozen 2025-07-28. Reachability, where shown, is from one Syntology probe window (2026-09-16 to 2026-09-18); repositories not probed show nothing. GitHub stars are not tracked.
Code Syntology ran Syntology
Not run by Syntology. Nothing on this page verifies that the listed code works.
Results from the paper archive 2025-07-28
No leaderboard rows for this paper in the archive.
Report a problem or propose a change · a person checks every report against the paper or source before anything changes; decisions are listed on /corrections