Colloquium
Plato's view on supermassive black hole binaries: Exploring the faintest limit of ESA's Plato space mission
Abstract
The search for supermassive black hole binaries (SMBHBs) seemingly saw the dawn of exploration over the past twenty years with several hundred sub-pc candidates claimed from photometric and spectroscopic surveys monitoring active galactic nuclei (AGNs). While the existence of SMBH pairs have been detected at kpc separation, the observational evidence for sub-pc SMBHBs is however still inconclusive. Finding and
expanding the arsenal of SMBHB candidates is not only vital for understanding the co-evolution with their galactic hosts, but is complementary to pulsar timing arrays searching for low-frequency gravitational waves. With the advancements of upcoming high-precision, wide-field optical photometric surveys, like Vera Rubin’s LSST, robust electromagnetic detections may therefore happen in the near future.
Following the pursuit of confirming SMBHBs in the optical, we explore the possibility of using the ESA Plato space mission to detect the photometric signature of Doppler boosting and gravitational self-lensing events linked to their binarity. Although not designed for it, in this seminar we will discuss how Plato may play an essential role in future searches of SMBHBs and for AGN variability research in general. With a minimum 2-yr baseline per pointing field, our simulation study also serves as a benchmark for the upcoming Plato Guest Observer (GO) call in April 2026 designed for complementary sciences alike
About the talk
Institute for Astronomy, KU Leuven & ING
iCalendar The search for supermassive black hole binaries (SMBHBs) seemingly saw the dawn of exploration over the past twenty years with several hundred sub-pc candidates claimed from photometric and spectroscopic surveys monitoring active galactic nuclei (AGNs). While the existence of SMBH pairs have been detected at kpc separation, the observational evidence for sub-pc SMBHBs is however still inconclusive. Finding and
expanding the arsenal of SMBHB candidates is not only vital for understanding the co-evolution with their galactic hosts, but is complementary to pulsar timing arrays searching for low-frequency gravitational waves. With the advancements of upcoming high-precision, wide-field optical photometric surveys, like Vera Rubin’s LSST, robust electromagnetic detections may therefore happen in the near future.
Following the pursuit of confirming SMBHBs in the optical, we explore the possibility of using the ESA Plato space mission to detect the photometric signature of Doppler boosting and gravitational self-lensing events linked to their binarity. Although not designed for it, in this seminar we will discuss how Plato may play an essential role in future searches of SMBHBs and for AGN variability research in general. With a minimum 2-yr baseline per pointing field, our simulation study also serves as a benchmark for the upcoming Plato Guest Observer (GO) call in April 2026 designed for complementary sciences alike&location=&trp=false&ctz=Atlantic/Canary' target='_blank' rel='nofollow' class='btn btn-primary btn-sm text-light' title='Export to Google Calendar'> Google Calendar
About the speaker
Nicholas Jannsen is a new Staff Observer at the ING on part-time until April. He is also a postdoc at KU Leuven, in Belgium, working with Prof. Conny Aerts on simulations for the upcoming ESA PLATO space mission. His work is tightly interlinked with the performance assessment and pipeline development of the mission. His own research focuses on optimising the overall yield of the PLATO Complementary Science program through highly realistic photometric simulations. While his past research focused on pulsating stars more massive and/or evolved than our Sun, he is now more broadly working within the realm of discovery: either on extra-galactic phenomena such as sub-parsec supermassive black hole binaries, or cool worlds such as extrasolar satellites around Sun-like stars (potential “Pandora” exomoons).