Magnetic fields during the formation of supermassive black holes

Latif, M. A.; Schleicher, D. R. G.; Schmidt, W.

Abstract

Observations of quasars at z $\gt$ 6 report the existence of a billion solar mass black holes. Comprehending their formation in such a short time-scale is a matter of ongoing research. One of the most promising scenarios to assemble supermassive black holes is a monolithic collapse of protogalactic gas clouds in atomic cooling haloes with T$_{vir}$ {\ge} 10$^{4}$ K. In this paper, we study the amplification and impact of magnetic fields during the formation of seed black holes in massive primordial haloes. We perform high-resolution cosmological magnetohydrodynamic simulations for four distinct haloes and follow their collapse for a few free-fall times until the simulations reach a peak density of 7 {\times} 10$^{-10}$ g cm$^{-3}$. Our findings show that irrespective of the initial seed field, the magnetic field strength reaches a saturated state in the presence of strong accretion shocks. Under such conditions, the growth time becomes very short and amplification occurs rapidly within a small fraction of the free-fall time. We find that the presence of such strong magnetic fields provides additional support against gravity and helps in suppressing fragmentation. Massive clumps of a few hundred solar masses are formed at the end of our simulations and high accretion rates of 1 M$_{⊙}$ yr$^{-1}$ are observed. We expect that in the presence of such accretion rates, the clumps will grow to form supermassive stars of {\tilde}10$^{5}$ M$_{⊙}$. Overall, the role of the magnetic fields seems supportive for the formation of massive black holes.

Más información

Título de la Revista: MONTHLY NOTICES OF THE ROYAL ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY
Volumen: 440
Número: 2
Editorial: Oxford Academic
Fecha de publicación: 2014
Página de inicio: 1551
Página final: 1561
DOI:

10.1093/mnras/stu357

Notas: ISI