Gravitational Waves from Massive Black Hole Mergers in ASTRID: Predictions for LISA (2503.24304v2)

Abstract: We use the ASTRID cosmological simulation to forecast massive black hole (MBH) mergers detectable by LISA down to $z=0$. ASTRID directly models MBH dynamical friction, allowing a realistic tracking of their trajectory. It also incorporates relatively low-mass MBH seeds down to $5\times 10^{4}\mathrm{M}_{\odot}$, providing a more complete picture of LISA MBH mergers. We find that LISA MBH mergers initially have high eccentricities, peaking around $e_0 = 0.8$ across all redshifts. Accounting for this boosts the event rate from 5.6/yr (if circular orbits are assumed) to 10.5/yr. This enhancement is largely due to additional inspiral sources that will coalesce after LISA's observation, which constitute 46% of detected events. This underscores the importance of LISA's sensitivity to the early inspiral phase, especially for eccentric binaries that emit gravitational waves across a wider frequency band. Most LISA events in ASTRID arise from $M_{\mathrm{BH}} \sim 10^{5-6}~\mathrm{M}_{\odot}$, low-redshift ($z<2$) and low mass-ratio ($q\sim 0.01-0.1)$ mergers. Accounting for eccentricity broadens the detectable MBH mass range up to $10^9~\mathrm{M}_{\odot}$, and shifts the peak of detectable mergers to a lower redshift $z_{\rm peak} = 0.8$. This implies that the most massive LISA events may also be PTA sources. We predict LISA events to be in various galaxy environments, including many low-mass satellite galaxies. The EM counterparts of most LISA sources have AGN luminosities $L_{\rm bol}> 10^{42}$erg/s, albeit only $1\%$ with $ > 10^{44}$erg/s. The brightest AGN are those associated with the rare LISA/PTA events with $M_{\rm BH} > 10^{8}~\mathrm{M}_{\odot}$.