Cygnus X-1 contains a 21-solar mass black hole-Implications for massive star winds

James C A Miller-Jones; Arash Bahramian; Jerome A Orosz; Ilya Mandel; Lijun Gou; Thomas J Maccarone; Coenraad J Neijssel; Xueshan Zhao; Janusz Ziółkowski; Mark J Reid; Phil Uttley; Xueying Zheng; Do-Young Byun; Richard Dodson; Victoria Grinberg; Taehyun Jung; Jeong-Sook Kim; Benito Marcote; Sera Markoff; María J Rioja; Anthony P Rushton; David M Russell; Gregory R Sivakoff; Alexandra J Tetarenko; Valeriu Tudose; Joern Wilms

doi:10.1126/science.abb3363

Cygnus X-1 contains a 21-solar mass black hole-Implications for massive star winds

Science. 2021 Mar 5;371(6533):1046-1049. doi: 10.1126/science.abb3363. Epub 2021 Feb 18.

Authors

James C A Miller-Jones¹, Arash Bahramian², Jerome A Orosz³, Ilya Mandel^{4

5

6}, Lijun Gou^{7

8}, Thomas J Maccarone⁹, Coenraad J Neijssel^{4

5

6}, Xueshan Zhao^{7

8}, Janusz Ziółkowski¹⁰, Mark J Reid¹¹, Phil Uttley¹², Xueying Zheng^{7

8}, Do-Young Byun^{13

14}, Richard Dodson¹⁵, Victoria Grinberg¹⁶, Taehyun Jung^{13

14}, Jeong-Sook Kim¹³, Benito Marcote¹⁷, Sera Markoff^{12

18}, María J Rioja^{15

19

20}, Anthony P Rushton^{21

22}, David M Russell²³, Gregory R Sivakoff²⁴, Alexandra J Tetarenko²⁵, Valeriu Tudose²⁶, Joern Wilms²⁷

Affiliations

¹ International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research-Curtin University, Perth, WA 6845, Australia. james.miller-jones@curtin.edu.au.
² International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research-Curtin University, Perth, WA 6845, Australia.
³ Astronomy Department, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA 92182-1221, USA.
⁴ School of Physics and Astronomy, Monash University, Clayton, VIC 3800, Australia.
⁵ OzGrav: The Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Gravitational Wave Discovery, Hawthorn, VIC 3122, Australia.
⁶ School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham B15 2TT, UK.
⁷ Key Laboratory for Computational Astrophysics, National Astronomical Observatories, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100012, China.
⁸ University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100012, China.
⁹ Department of Physics and Astronomy, Texas Tech University, Lubbock, TX 79409-1051, USA.
¹⁰ Nicolaus Copernicus Astronomical Center, PL-00-716 Warsaw, Poland.
¹¹ Center for Astrophysics, Harvard and Smithsonian, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA.
¹² Anton Pannekoek Institute for Astronomy, University of Amsterdam, 1098 XH Amsterdam, Netherlands.
¹³ Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute, Daejeon 34055, Republic of Korea.
¹⁴ University of Science and Technology, Daejeon 34113, Republic of Korea.
¹⁵ International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research-University of Western Australia, Crawley, WA 6009, Australia.
¹⁶ Institut für Astronomie und Astrophysik, Universität Tübingen, 72076 Tübingen, Germany.
¹⁷ Joint Institute for Very Long Baseline Interferometry European Research Infrastructure Consortium, 7991 PD Dwingeloo, Netherlands.
¹⁸ Gravitation and Astroparticle Physics Amsterdam Institute, University of Amsterdam, NL-1098 XH Amsterdam, Netherlands.
¹⁹ Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, Astronomy and Space Science, Perth, WA 6102, Australia.
²⁰ Observatorio Astronómico Nacional, Instituto Geográfico Nacional, 28014 Madrid, Spain.
²¹ Department of Physics, Astrophysics, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3RH, UK.
²² School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Southampton, Southampton SO17 1BJ, UK.
²³ Center for Astro, Particle, and Planetary Physics, New York University Abu Dhabi, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
²⁴ Department of Physics, Centennial Centre for Interdisciplinary Science, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB T6G 2E1, Canada.
²⁵ East Asian Observatory, Hilo, HI 96720, USA.
²⁶ Institute for Space Sciences, 077125 Bucharest-Magurele, Romania.
²⁷ Dr. Karl Remeis-Sternwarte and Erlangen Centre for Astroparticle Physics, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, 96049 Bamberg, Germany.

PMID: 33602863
DOI: 10.1126/science.abb3363

Abstract

The evolution of massive stars is influenced by the mass lost to stellar winds over their lifetimes. These winds limit the masses of the stellar remnants (such as black holes) that the stars ultimately produce. We used radio astrometry to refine the distance to the black hole x-ray binary Cygnus X-1, which we found to be [Formula: see text] kiloparsecs. When combined with archival optical data, this implies a black hole mass of 21.2 ± 2.2 solar masses, which is higher than previous measurements. The formation of such a high-mass black hole in a high-metallicity system (within the Milky Way) constrains wind mass loss from massive stars.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't