Orbital circularisation of white dwarfs and the formation of gravitational radiation sources in star clusters containing an intermediate mass black hole

Understand

(abbreviated) We consider how tight binaries consisting of a super-massive black hole of mass $M=10^{3}-10^{4}M_{\odot}$ and a white dwarf can be formed in a globular cluster.

• We point out that a major fraction of white dwarfs tidally captured by the black hole may be destroyed by tidal inflation during ongoing circularisation, and the formation of tight binaries is inhibited.
• However, some stars may survive being spun up to high rotation rates.
• Then the energy loss through gravitational wave emission induced by tidally excited pulsation modes and dissipation through non linear effects may compete with the increase of pulsation energy due to dynamic tides.