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Stellar-Mass Black Holes in the Solar Neighborhood

James R. Chisholm·Scott Dodelson·Edward W. Kolb
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Abstract

We search for nearby, isolated, accreting, ``stellar-mass'' (3 to $100M_\odot$) black holes. Models suggest a synchrotron spectrum in visible wavelengths and some emission in X-ray wavelengths. Of 3.7 million objects in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Early Data Release, about 150,000 objects have colors and properties consistent with such a spectrum, and 87 of these objects are X-ray sources from the ROSAT All Sky Survey. Thirty-two of these have been confirmed not to be black-holes using optical spectra. We give the positions and colors of these 55 black-hole candidates, and quantitatively rank them on their likelihood to be black holes. We discuss uncertainties the expected number of sources, and the contribution of blackholes to local dark matter.

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James R. Chisholm, Scott Dodelson, Edward W. Kolb. 2003-06-18. Stellar-Mass Black Holes in the Solar Neighborhood. https://doi.org/10.1086/377628

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