- Physical Review Journals
All JournalsPhysics Magazine

Physical Review D

Reuse & Permissions

It is not necessary to obtain permission to reuse this article or its components as it is available under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI are maintained. Please note that some figures may have been included with permission from other third parties. It is your responsibility to obtain the proper permission from the rights holder directly for these figures.

Export citation

Export citation

Choose format for download:

Download Citation
  • Open Access

Excitation of scalar quasinormal modes from boson clouds

Enrico Cannizzaro1,*, Marco Palleschi2, Laura Sberna3, Richard Brito1, and Stephen R. Green3

  • *Contact author: enrico.cannizzaro@tecnico.ulisboa.pt
PDF

Phys. Rev. D 113, 083039 – Published 24 April, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/fbwb-1hcz

Abstract

Massive scalar fields on black hole backgrounds generally admit two families of modes: quasibound states (QBSs) and quasinormal modes (QNMs). We demonstrate the orthogonality between the two mode families with respect to a relativistic product. We also find that, although the two families appear on different Riemann sheets of the Green’s function of massive scalar perturbations, they can be brought to a single sheet with an appropriate redefinition of the frequency variable. In this variable, it is more natural to see how both mode families can be excited by initial data, and to approximate the Green’s function with saddle points. Finally, we investigate the QNM emission from boson clouds—the latter effectively consisting of a single QBS—driven by the tidal perturbation of a second compact object. We show that while the resonant emission of QNMs is generally suppressed, QNM transitions may be more prominent when the interaction with the perturber is nonresonant, such as in the dynamical capture of unbound objects, and when the perturber transits close to the light ring.

View figure in article

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Article Text

References (57)

  1. R. Brito, V. Cardoso, and P. Pani, Superradiance: New Frontiers in Black Hole Physics, Vol. 906 (Springer, New York, 2015).
  2. A. Arvanitaki, S. Dimopoulos, S. Dubovsky, N. Kaloper, and J. March-Russell, Phys. Rev. D 81, 123530 (2010).
  3. A. Arvanitaki and S. Dubovsky, Phys. Rev. D 83, 044026 (2011).
  4. B. Kocsis, N. Yunes, and A. Loeb, Phys. Rev. D 84, 024032 (2011).
  5. N. Yunes, B. Kocsis, A. Loeb, and Z. Haiman, Phys. Rev. Lett. 107, 171103 (2011).
  6. L. Speri, A. Antonelli, L. Sberna, S. Babak, E. Barausse, J. R. Gair, and M. L. Katz, Phys. Rev. X 13, 021035 (2023).
  7. D. Baumann, H. S. Chia, and R. A. Porto, Phys. Rev. D 99, 044001 (2019).
  8. D. Baumann, H. S. Chia, R. A. Porto, and J. Stout, Phys. Rev. D 101, 083019 (2020).
  9. D. Baumann, G. Bertone, J. Stout, and G. M. Tomaselli, Phys. Rev. D 105, 115036 (2022).
  10. D. Baumann, G. Bertone, J. Stout, and G. M. Tomaselli, Phys. Rev. Lett. 128, 221102 (2022).
  11. G. M. Tomaselli, T. F. M. Spieksma, and G. Bertone, J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys. 07 (2023) 070.
  12. G. M. Tomaselli, T. F. M. Spieksma, and G. Bertone, Phys. Rev. D 110, 064048 (2024).
  13. R. Brito and S. Shah, Phys. Rev. D 108, 084019 (2023); 110, 109902(E) (2024).
  14. F. Duque, C. F. B. Macedo, R. Vicente, and V. Cardoso, Phys. Rev. Lett. 133, 121404 (2024).
  15. C. Dyson, T. F. M. Spieksma, R. Brito, M. van de Meent, and S. Dolan, Phys. Rev. Lett. 134, 211403 (2025).
  16. P. S. Cole, G. Bertone, A. Coogan, D. Gaggero, T. Karydas, B. J. Kavanagh, T. F. M. Spieksma, and G. M. Tomaselli, Nat. Astron. 7, 943 (2023).
  17. R. Della Monica and R. Brito, Phys. Rev. D 112, 024074 (2025).
  18. D. Li, C. Weller, P. Bourg, M. LaHaye, N. Yunes, and H. Yang, Phys. Rev. D 112, 084057 (2025).
  19. E. Cannizzaro, L. Sberna, S. R. Green, and S. Hollands, Phys. Rev. Lett. 132, 051401 (2024).
  20. J. Percival and S. R. Dolan, Phys. Rev. D 102, 104055 (2020).
  21. Y. Decanini, A. Folacci, and M. Ould El Hadj, Phys. Rev. D 92, 024057 (2015).
  22. J. Thornburg, B. Wardell, and M. van de Meent, Phys. Rev. Res. 2, 013365 (2020).
  23. J. Thornburg and B. Wardell, Phys. Rev. D 95, 084043 (2017).
  24. S. O’Sullivan and S. A. Hughes, Phys. Rev. D 90, 124039 (2014); 91, 109901(E) (2015).
  25. Y. Kojima and T. Nakamura, Prog. Theor. Phys. 72, 494 (1984).
  26. S. R. Green, S. Hollands, L. Sberna, V. Toomani, and P. Zimmerman, Phys. Rev. D 107, 064030 (2023).
  27. E. Berti et al., arXiv:2505.23895.
  28. E. W. Leaver, Phys. Rev. D 34, 384 (1986).
  29. S. Ma and H. Yang, Phys. Rev. D 109, 104070 (2024).
  30. E. W. Leaver, Proc. R. Soc. A 402, 285 (1985).
  31. S. R. Dolan, Phys. Rev. D 76, 084001 (2007).
  32. https://github.com/laurasberna/blackhole-QBS-QNM.
  33. H.-P. Nollert and B. G. Schmidt, Phys. Rev. D 45, 2617 (1992).
  34. N. Andersson, Phys. Rev. D 51, 353 (1995).
  35. E. Berti and V. Cardoso, Phys. Rev. D 74, 104020 (2006).
  36. K. Glampedakis and N. Andersson, Phys. Rev. D 64, 104021 (2001).
  37. S. Hod and T. Piran, Phys. Rev. D 58, 044018 (1998).
  38. H. Koyama and A. Tomimatsu, Phys. Rev. D 64, 044014 (2001).
  39. H. Koyama and A. Tomimatsu, Phys. Rev. D 65, 084031 (2002).
  40. T. Tamir and A. Oliner, Guided Complex Waves. Part 1: Fields at an Interface (Proceedings of the Institution of Electrical Engineers, 1962), 10.1049/piee.1963.0044.
  41. M. Gallezot, F. Treyssède, and L. Laguerre, J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 141, EL16 (2017).
  42. J. Feldbrugge, J.-L. Lehners, and N. Turok, Phys. Rev. D 95, 103508 (2017).
  43. R. Miranda and R. R. Rafikov, Astrophys. J. 892, 65 (2020).
  44. J. J. Brown and G. I. Ogilvie, Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 534, 39 (2024).
  45. R. A. Konoplya and A. V. Zhidenko, Phys. Lett. B 609, 377 (2005).
  46. R. A. Konoplya and A. Zhidenko, Phys. Rev. D 73, 124040 (2006).
  47. Y. Décanini, A. Folacci, and M. Ould El Hadj, Phys. Rev. D 89, 084066 (2014).
  48. J. a. P. Cavalcante, M. Richartz, and B. C. da Cunha, Phys. Rev. D 110, 124064 (2024).
  49. P. Amaro-Seoane, Living Rev. Relativity 21, 4 (2018).
  50. P. Amaro-Seoane et al., arXiv:1702.00786.
  51. J. Zhang and H. Yang, Phys. Rev. D 101, 043020 (2020).
  52. https://github.com/thomasspieksma/GrAB.
  53. J. Redondo-Yuste, D. Pereñiguez, and V. Cardoso, Phys. Rev. D 109, 044048 (2024).
  54. C. Yuan, V. Cardoso, F. Duque, and Z. Younsi, Phys. Rev. D 111, 063048 (2025).
  55. J. S. Santos, V. Cardoso, J. Natário, and M. van de Meent, Phys. Rev. Lett. 135, 211402 (2025).
  56. M. De Amicis, S. Albanesi, and G. Carullo, Phys. Rev. D 110, 104005 (2024).
  57. T. Islam, G. Faggioli, G. Khanna, S. E. Field, M. van de Meent, and A. Buonanno, Phys. Rev. D 112, 024061 (2025).

Outline

Information

Phys. Rev. D 113, 083039– Published 24 April, 2026
  • Received 23 January 2026
  • Accepted 2 April 2026
Crossmark - Check for updates button
Creative Commons Logo

Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI.

Published by the American Physical Society

Sign In to Your Journals Account

Filter

Filter

Article Lookup

Enter a citation