PreprintCC BY-NC-ND 4.0arXiv
Devoured by a Hairy Gargantua: Probing Massive Scalar Charges with Non-minimal Curvature Coupling with Extreme-Mass-Ratio Inspirals
Abstract
Ultralight scalar fields nonminimally coupled to curvature can endow rotating black holes with stationary hair and alter nearby orbits. Using recently constructed hairy black-hole spacetimes, we model the transition to plunge of an extreme-mass-ratio inspiral. For scalar masses μM=0.01 and $0.1$ and dimensionless curvature coupling ζ=10−3,10−4, we find 𝒪(10) rad of gravitational-wave dephasing relative to general relativity over 𝒪(103) orbits. A multimode Fisher forecast at μM=0.2, where neighbouring hair solutions permit a numerical μ-derivative, suggests that ζ and μ could be measured to precisions of ≃0.2% and $0.6−−1.1\%$, respectively, for a source with signal-to-noise ratio of about 80 in LISA.
Related
- Hyperon bulk viscosity effects in neutron-star inspirals
- Pitching Cosmic Curveballs: Environmental Effects on Extreme-Mass-Ratio Inspirals with Spinning Secondaries
- 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
- Reconstructing the Dark Matter Equation of State with Compact Object Inspirals
BibTeX
@misc{lui2026devoured,
title = {{Devoured by a Hairy Gargantua: Probing Massive Scalar Charges with Non-minimal Curvature Coupling with Extreme-Mass-Ratio Inspirals}},
author = {Leif Lui and Adrian Ka-Wai Chung and Alejandro Torres-Orjuela},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = aug,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2608.28037},
eprint = {2608.28037},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2608.28037},
note = {CC BY-NC-ND 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Devoured by a Hairy Gargantua: Probing Massive Scalar Charges with Non-minimal Curvature Coupling with Extreme-Mass-Ratio Inspirals
AU - Leif Lui
AU - Adrian Ka-Wai Chung
AU - Alejandro Torres-Orjuela
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/08/28
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2608.28037
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2608.28037
AB - Ultralight scalar fields nonminimally coupled to curvature can endow rotating black holes with stationary hair and alter nearby orbits. Using recently constructed hairy black-hole spacetimes, we model the transition to plunge of an extreme-mass-ratio inspiral. For scalar masses μM=0.01 and $0.1$ and dimensionless curvature coupling ζ=10^−3,10^−4, we find 𝒪(10) rad of gravitational-wave dephasing relative to general relativity over 𝒪(10^3) orbits. A multimode Fisher forecast at μM=0.2, where neighbouring hair solutions permit a numerical μ-derivative, suggests that ζ and μ could be measured to precisions of ≃0.2% and $0.6−−1.1\%$, respectively, for a source with signal-to-noise ratio of about 80 in LISA.
ER -