Mar Mezcua (Max-Planck-Institut fuer Radioastronomie)

Supermassive Binary Black Holes in Active Galaxies -- Mar Mezcua Colloquium

Marsfield Lecture Theatre

Abstract

It is widely accepted that galaxies are not isolated objects in the Universe, but are rather observed to undergo galaxy merging. If nearly all galaxies host a supermassive black hole in their center, it is expected that pairs of supermassive black holes will be formed in the course of a
merger event. The detection and number estimates of binary black hole systems can, thus, help us to understand how galaxies form and grow, and shed light on the evolutionary models that rule the Universe.

In this Colloquium I’ll present the results of my Ph.D. thesis, which aims to pursue observational evidence for binary black hole systems. For this, I have analyzed three kinds of extragalactic objects: X-shaped radio galaxies, ultraluminous X-ray sources, and double nucleus galaxies. I will detail our observations and analyses of these systems and the conclusions obtained when combined all observational data.