Fast Radio Bursts and Radio Transients from Black Hole Batteries

Understand

Most black holes (BHs) will absorb a neutron star (NS) companion fully intact, without tidal disruption, suggesting the pair will remain dark to telescopes.

• Even without tidal disruption, electromagnetic luminosity is generated from the battery phase of the binary when the BH interacts with the NS magnetic field.
• Originally the luminosity was expected in high-energy X-rays or gamma-rays, however we conjecture that some of the battery power is emitted in the radio bandwidth.
• While the luminosity and timescale are suggestive of fast radio bursts (FRBs; millisecond-scale radio transients) NS--BH coalescence rates are too low to make these a primary FRB source.