Stimulated Emission from Boson Clouds

Abstract

Gravitational-waves from astrophysical sources are characterized by their extreme faintness, which remains a primary obstacle for both current and next generation detectors. While rotating black holes dressed in superradiant clouds of ultralight bosons are recognized as promising probes of physics beyond the Standard Model, their capacity to actively emit and modulate gravitational radiation remains largely unexamined. Here we demonstrate that these gravitational atoms can function as natural amplifiers of gravitational-waves via a stimulated emission mechanism analogous to astrophysical masers. By formalizing the interaction between the bosonic cloud and an ambient stochastic gravitational-wave background, we establish the rigorous selection rules and threshold conditions that govern this amplification. Our analysis reveals that the emission rate depends critically on the boson mass, potentially yielding an enhancement of several orders of magnitude over spontaneous processes. For representative mass ranges, these amplified signals bridge the sensitivity gap between ground-based interferometers and pulsar timing arrays. These findings suggest that superradiant clouds can effectively boost previously undetectable signals, offering a novel observational frontier for exploring ultralight fields and the Kerr spacetime environment.