Background of gravitational waves from pre-galactic black hole formation

Abstract

We study the generation of a gravitational wave (GW) background produced from a population of core-collapse supernovae, which form black holes in scenarios of structure formation of the Universe. We obtain, for example, that a pre-galactic population of black holes, formed at redshifts $z\simeq 30-10$, could generate a stochastic GW background with a maximum amplitude of $h_{\rm BG}\simeq 10^{-24}$ in the frequency band $ν_{\rm obs}\simeq 30-470 {\rm Hz}$ (considering a maximum efficiency of generation of GWs, namely, $ε_{\rm GW}=7\times 10^{-4}$). In particular, we discuss what astrophysical information could be obtained from a positive, or even a negative, detection of such a GW background produced in scenarios such as those studied here. One of them is the possibility of obtaining the initial and final redshifts of the emission period from the observed spectrum of GWs.