Pitching Cosmic Curveballs: Environmental Effects on Extreme-Mass-Ratio Inspirals with Spinning Secondaries
Abstract
Much like the aerodynamic deflection of a spinning curveball, a rotating secondary in an extreme-mass-ratio inspiral (EMRI) experiences Magnus and lift forces, in addition to the standard drag force, when traversing a gaseous environment. We present the first framework that incorporates these specific spin-coupled environmental effects (EEs) into the evolution of EMRI. Over the multi-year observation windows of space-based gravitational-wave (GW) detectors, these interactions imprint a unique, distinguishable dephasing signature on the signal. Crucially, a Fisher matrix analysis reveals that gas drag breaks the fundamental vacuum-projection degeneracy between the secondary's spin magnitude and inclination, thereby tightening parameter constraints. Thus, accounting for EEs is not merely a modeling necessity, but could potentially be a powerful tool for enhancing the detectability of the secondary's intrinsic spin, and could serve as a novel probe of accretion flows harboring massive black holes.
Versions
Related
- Hyperon bulk viscosity effects in neutron-star inspirals
- Devoured by a Hairy Gargantua: Probing Massive Scalar Charges with Non-minimal Curvature Coupling with Extreme-Mass-Ratio Inspirals
- Subpopulation of low-mass, spinning black holes: Signatures of dynamical assembly
- A compact time-domain reduced order quadrature for gravitational wave inspirals with non-stationary noise
- Self-lensing of electromagnetic counterparts to extreme mass ratio inspirals
BibTeX
@misc{lui2026pitching,
title = {{Pitching Cosmic Curveballs: Environmental Effects on Extreme-Mass-Ratio Inspirals with Spinning Secondaries}},
author = {Leif Lui and Lisa V. Drummond and Alejandro Torres-Orjuela},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = sep,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2606.01569},
eprint = {2606.01569},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2606.01569},
note = {CC BY-NC-ND 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Pitching Cosmic Curveballs: Environmental Effects on Extreme-Mass-Ratio Inspirals with Spinning Secondaries
AU - Leif Lui
AU - Lisa V. Drummond
AU - Alejandro Torres-Orjuela
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/09/01
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2606.01569
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2606.01569
AB - Much like the aerodynamic deflection of a spinning curveball, a rotating secondary in an extreme-mass-ratio inspiral (EMRI) experiences Magnus and lift forces, in addition to the standard drag force, when traversing a gaseous environment. We present the first framework that incorporates these specific spin-coupled environmental effects (EEs) into the evolution of EMRI. Over the multi-year observation windows of space-based gravitational-wave (GW) detectors, these interactions imprint a unique, distinguishable dephasing signature on the signal. Crucially, a Fisher matrix analysis reveals that gas drag breaks the fundamental vacuum-projection degeneracy between the secondary's spin magnitude and inclination, thereby tightening parameter constraints. Thus, accounting for EEs is not merely a modeling necessity, but could potentially be a powerful tool for enhancing the detectability of the secondary's intrinsic spin, and could serve as a novel probe of accretion flows harboring massive black holes.
ER -