On Constraining the Growth History of Massive Black Holes via Their Distribution on the Spin-Mass Plane

Understand

The spin distribution of massive black holes (MBHs) contains rich information on the MBH growth history.

• In this paper, we investigate the spin evolution of MBHs by assuming that each MBH experiences two-phase accretion, with an initial phase of coherent-accretion via either the standard thin disc or super-Eddington disc, followed by a chaotic-accretion phase composed of many episodes with different disc orientations.
• If the chaotic-phase is significant to the growth of an MBH, the MBH spin quickly reaches the maximum value because of the initial coherent-accretion, then changes to a quasi-equilibrium state and fluctuates around a value mainly determined by the mean ratio of the disc to the MBH mass ($M_{\bullet}$) in the chaotic-accretion episodes, and further declines due to late chaotic-accretion if $M_\bullet \gtrsim (1-3) \times 10^8 M_\odot$.
• The turning point to this decline is determined by the equality of the disc warp radius and disc size.