New Moon-based gravitational-wave (GW) detector concepts, such as the lunar gravitational-wave antenna (LGWA), aim to observe GWs from 1 millihertz (mHz) to a few hertz, with optimal sensitivity in the decihertz band. Binary systems containing at least one intermediate-mass black hole (IMBH) are widely believed to generate GWs spanning from mHz to a few Hz, making them a key scientific target for the LGWA. We explore the detectability of IMBH binaries with the LGWA in this work. Considering a signal-to-noise ratio threshold of 10, our results imply that the LGWA can detect IMBH binaries up to <InlineEquation ID="IEq1"> <InlineMediaObject> <ImageObject Color="BlackWhite" FileRef="44453_2025_2_Article_IEq1.gif" Format="GIF" Height="19" Rendition="HTML" Resolution="72" Type="Linedraw" Width="75" /> </InlineMediaObject> <EquationSource Format="TEX">$z \sim {\mathcal{O}}(10)$</EquationSource> <EquationSource Format="MATHML"><math> <mrow> <mi>z</mi> <mo>~</mo> <mi class="MJX-tex-caligraphic" mathvariant="script">O</mi> <mrow> <mo>(</mo> <mrow> <mn>10</mn> </mrow> <mo>)</mo> </mrow> </mrow> </math></EquationSource> </InlineEquation>. We further show that the LGWA can constrain the primary mass with relative errors ≲ 0.1% for binaries at z ≲ 0.5. Furthermore, we show that the IMBH binaries at z ≲ 0.1 can be used to constrain redshift with relative errors ≲ 10%, and those with m1 ∈ [104, 105] M⊙ can be localized by the LGWA to be within <InlineEquation ID="IEq2"> <InlineMediaObject> <ImageObject Color="BlackWhite" FileRef="44453_2025_2_Article_IEq2.gif" Format="GIF" Height="21" Rendition="HTML" Resolution="72" Type="Linedraw" Width="74" /> </InlineMediaObject> <EquationSource Format="TEX">${\mathcal{O}}(10){{\rm{deg}}}^{2}$</EquationSource> <EquationSource Format="MATHML"><math> <mrow> <mi class="MJX-tex-caligraphic" mathvariant="script">O</mi> <mrow> <mo>(</mo> <mrow> <mn>10</mn> </mrow> <mo>)</mo> </mrow> <msup> <mrow> <mi mathvariant="normal">deg</mi> </mrow> <mrow> <mn>2</mn> </mrow> </msup> </mrow> </math></EquationSource> </InlineEquation>.

Probing intermediate-mass black hole binaries with the lunar gravitational-wave antenna

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2025年8月6日

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Hanlin Song,
Han Yan,
Yacheng Kang,
Xian Chen,
Junjie Zhao,
Lijing Shao

摘要

New Moon-based gravitational-wave (GW) detector concepts, such as the lunar gravitational-wave antenna (LGWA), aim to observe GWs from 1 millihertz (mHz) to a few hertz, with optimal sensitivity in the decihertz band. Binary systems containing at least one intermediate-mass black hole (IMBH) are widely believed to generate GWs spanning from mHz to a few Hz, making them a key scientific target for the LGWA. We explore the detectability of IMBH binaries with the LGWA in this work. Considering a signal-to-noise ratio threshold of 10, our results imply that the LGWA can detect IMBH binaries up to $z \sim {\mathcal{O}}(10)$ $z ~ O (10)$ . We further show that the LGWA can constrain the primary mass with relative errors ≲ 0.1% for binaries at z ≲ 0.5. Furthermore, we show that the IMBH binaries at z ≲ 0.1 can be used to constrain redshift with relative errors ≲ 10%, and those with m₁ ∈ [10⁴, 10⁵] M_⊙ can be localized by the LGWA to be within ${\mathcal{O}}(10){{\rm{deg}}}^{2}$ $O (10) \deg^{2}$ .