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D. Richstone (U. Michigan), K. Gebhardt (UCSC/Lick Observatory), J. Pinkney (U. Michigan)
We consider the implications of the nuclear black holes reported in the preceeding talk by Gebhardt et. al. These objects tend to have masses smaller than predicted by the correlation noted previously (for example by Kormendy & Richstone (ARAA) or Magorrian et. al (AJ 1998)) between BH mass and galaxy bulge light. Even though we find a wide variation of black-hole masses for galaxies with similar properties, we are unable to rule out a nuclear black hole in any galaxy under study. The apparent connection between the galaxy and its central black hole has important implications for galaxy evolution and black hole growth, suggesting that black holes form early and have short duty-cycles as AGNs. In particular, we discuss the possibility of detecting merging supermassive black holes (with LISA) via their emission of gravitational radiation.
The author(s) of this abstract have provided an email address for comments about the abstract: dor@umich.edu