- 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

Orbital evolution of asymmetric binaries within accreting environments

Albert Radulea1,*, Marcelo Rubio2,3,4,†, Konstantinos Kritos5,‡, and Andrea Maselli2,3,§

  • *Contact author: albert.radulea@ensta.fr
  • †Contact author: marcelo.rubio@gssi.it
  • ‡Contact author: kkritos1@jhu.edu
  • §Contact author: andrea.maselli@gssi.it
PDF

Phys. Rev. D 114, 063059 – Published 29 September, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/mk8r-8db5

Abstract

Extreme mass-ratio inspirals embedded in accretion disks provide a natural arena for studying the interplay between relativistic orbital dynamics and environmental effects. In this work, we develop a framework to investigate the secular evolution of compact objects repeatedly crossing an accretion disk around a supermassive black hole. The orbital motion is modeled through Kerr geodesics, while disk interactions are encoded through effective prescriptions for mass accretion and dynamical friction. We find that disk-induced dissipation generically drives a two-stage evolution characterized by rapid alignment of the orbital plane with the disk, followed by slower eccentricity damping. By systematically comparing the dynamics with a purely Keplerian treatment, we show that cumulative relativistic effects produce deviations even at large orbital separations, where the Keplerian approximation would naively be expected to remain accurate. These discrepancies grow through repeated disk crossings and become increasingly pronounced in more relativistic orbital configurations. We further investigate the impact of the accretion-disk model by comparing the Sirko-Goodman and Novikov-Thorne prescriptions. Relativistic disk structures predict systematically lower densities and larger scale heights, leading to weaker orbital dissipation and slower secular evolution. By contrast, the spin of the central black hole has only a minor effect on the overall circularization efficiency. Our results demonstrate the importance of consistently modeling both relativistic orbital dynamics and disk structure when studying compact objects embedded in active galactic nuclei disks, and provide a framework for exploring their long-term evolution, as well as a possible connection to quasiperiodic eruptions.

View figure in article

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Article Text

References (53)

  1. V. Cardoso and P. Pani, Living Rev. Relativity 22, 4 (2019).
  2. E. Barausse, V. Cardoso, and P. Pani, Phys. Rev. D 89, 104059 (2014).
  3. P. A. Seoane et al. (LISA Collaboration), Living Rev. Relativity 26, 2 (2023).
  4. K. G. Arun et al. (LISA Collaboration), Living Rev. Relativity 25, 4 (2022).
  5. F. S. Broekgaarden, S. Banagiri, and E. Payne, Astrophys. J. 969, 108 (2024).
  6. A. Toubiana, L. Sberna, A. Caputo, G. Cusin, S. Marsat, K. Jani, S. Babak, E. Barausse, C. Caprini, P. Pani, A. Sesana, and N. Tamanini, Phys. Rev. Lett. 126, 101105 (2021).
  7. V. Cardoso and A. Maselli, Astron. Astrophys. 644, A147 (2020).
  8. L. Zwick, P. R. Capelo, and L. Mayer, Phys. Rev. D 110, 103005 (2024).
  9. P. Amaro-Seoane, Living Rev. Relativity 21, 4 (2018).
  10. L. Barack et al., Classical Quantum Gravity 36, 143001 (2019).
  11. E. Barausse and L. Rezzolla, Phys. Rev. D 77 (2008).
  12. F. H. Nouri and A. Janiuk, Astron. Astrophys. 669, A184(2024), https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/full_html/2024/07/aa48796-23/aa48796-23.html.
  13. V. Cardoso, K. Destounis, F. Duque, R. P. Macedo, and A. Maselli, Phys. Rev. Lett. 129, 241103 (2022).
  14. E. Grishin, S. Gilbaum, and N. C. Stone, Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 530, 2114 (2024); 535, 1693(E) (2024).
  15. M. A. Sedda, S. Naoz, and B. Kocsis, Universe 9, 138 (2023).
  16. Y. Zeng and Z. Pan, Phys. Rev. D 113, 123002 (2026).
  17. G. Fabj, S. S. Nasim, F. Caban, K. E. S. Ford, B. McKernan, and J. M. Bellovary, Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 499, 2608 (2020).
  18. I. Linial and B. D. Metzger, Astrophys. J. 957, 34 (2023).
  19. A. Franchini, M. Bonetti, A. Lupi, G. Miniutti, E. Bortolas, M. Giustini, M. Dotti, A. Sesana, R. Arcodia, and T. Ryu, Astron. Astrophys. 675, A100 (2023).
  20. T. F. M. Spieksma and E. Cannizzaro, Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 546, stag021 (2026).
  21. J. E. Pringle, Annu. Rev. Astron. Astrophys. 19, 137 (1981).
  22. N. I. Shakura and R. A. Sunyaev, Astron. Astrophys. 24, 337 (1973), https://inspirehep.net/literature/73651.
  23. N. I. Shakura and R. A. Sunyaev, Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 175, 613 (1976).
  24. P. C. Fragile and M. Liska, Tilted accretion disks, in New Frontiers in GRMHD Simulations (Springer, Singapore, 2025).
  25. I. K. Dihingia and C. Fendt, Thin accretion disks in GR-MHD simulations, in New Frontiers in GRMHD Simulations (Springer, Singapore, 2025).
  26. M. A. Abramowicz and P. C. Fragile, Living Rev. Relativity 16, 1 (2013).
  27. R. F. Penna, J. C. McKinney, R. Narayan, A. Tchekhovskoy, R. Shafee, and J. E. McClintock, Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 408, 752 (2010).
  28. A. Toomre, Astrophys. J. 139, 1217 (1964).
  29. K. Kratter and G. Lodato, Annu. Rev. Astron. Astrophys. 54, 271 (2016).
  30. D. N. Page and K. S. Thorne, Astrophys. J. 191, 499 (1974).
  31. E. Agol and J. Krolik, Astrophys. J. 528, 161 (2000).
  32. J. H. Krolik and J. F. Hawley, Astrophys. J. 573, 754 (2002).
  33. W. Kley and R. P. Nelson, Annu. Rev. Astron. Astrophys. 50, 211 (2012).
  34. S. DeLaurentiis, M. Epstein-Martin, and Z. Haiman, Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 523, 1126 (2023).
  35. E. C. Ostriker, Astrophys. J. 513, 252 (1999).
  36. H. Tagawa, Z. Haiman, and B. Kocsis, Astrophys. J. 898, 25 (2020).
  37. R. Narayan, Astrophys. J. 536, 663 (2000).
  38. R. G. Edgar, New Astron. Rev. 48, 843 (2004).
  39. R. Fujita and W. Hikida, Classical Quantum Gravity 26, 135002 (2009).
  40. B. Carter, Commun. Math. Phys. 10, 280 (1968).
  41. W. Schmidt, Classical Quantum Gravity 19, 2743 (2002).
  42. S. Park and Z. Nasipak, J. Open Source Softwaare 9, 6587 (2024).
  43. G. Miniutti, R. D. Saxton, M. Giustini, K. D. Alexander, R. P. Fender, I. Heywood, I. Monageng, M. Coriat, A. K. Tzioumis, A. M. Read, C. Knigge, P. Gandhi, M. L. Pretorius, and B. Agís-González, Nature (London) 573, 381 (2019).
  44. I. Zalamea, K. Menou, and A. M. Beloborodov, Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 409, L25 (2010).
  45. A. King, Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 493, L120 (2020).
  46. M. Cufari, E. R. Coughlin, and C. J. Nixon, Astrophys. J. Lett. 929, L20 (2022).
  47. M. Nicholl et al., Nature (London) 634, 804 (2024).
  48. M. Sniegowska, B. Czerny, E. Bon, and N. Bon, Astronomy I& Astrophysics 641, A167 (2020).
  49. A. Raj and C. J. Nixon, Astrophys. J. 909, 82 (2021).
  50. X. Pan, S.-L. Li, X. Cao, G. Miniutti, and M. Gu, Astrophys. J. Lett. 928, L18 (2022).
  51. D. Syer, C. J. Clarke, and M. J. Rees, Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 250, 505 (1991).
  52. P. C. Peters, Phys. Rev. 136, B1224 (1964).
  53. I. Mandel, Res. Notes AAS 5, 223 (2021).

Outline

Information

Phys. Rev. D 114, 063059– Published 29 September, 2026
  • Received 21 June 2026
  • Accepted 10 September 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