Abundance of LIGO/Virgo Black Holes from Microlensing Observations of Quasars with Reverberation Mapping Size Estimates

Esteban-Gutiérrez, A.; Agües-Paszkowsky, N.; Mediavilla, E.; Jiménez-Vicente, J.; Muñoz, J. A.; Heydenreich, S.
Bibliographical reference

The Astrophysical Journal

Advertised on:
4
2022
Number of authors
6
IAC number of authors
3
Citations
4
Refereed citations
2
Description
Assuming a population of black holes (BHs) with masses in the range inferred by LIGO/Virgo from BH mergers, we use quasar microlensing observations to estimate their abundances. We consider a mixed population of stars and BHs and the presence of a smooth dark matter component. We adopt reverberation mapping estimates of the quasar size. According to a Bayesian analysis of the measured microlensing magnifications, a population of BHs with masses ~30M ⊙ constitutes less than 0.4% of the total matter at the 68% confidence level (less than 0.9% at the 90% confidence level). We have explored the whole mass range of LIGO/Virgo BHs, finding that this upper limit ranges from 0.5% to 0.4% at the 68% confidence level (from 1.1% to 0.9% at the 90% confidence level) when the BH masses change from 10 to 60M ⊙. We estimate a 16% contribution from the stars, in agreement with previous studies based on a single-mass population that do not explicitly consider the presence of BHs. These results are consistent with the estimates of BH abundances from the statistics of LIGO/Virgo mergers, and rule out primordial BHs (or any other types of compact object) in this mass range constituting a significant fraction of the dark matter.