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Abstract

Standard models for stellar core collapse predict the birth of neutron stars with masses exceeding a solar mass. In the collapsar model, a rapidly rotating massive star collapses to a black hole surrounded by a dense, neutrino-cooled accretion disk, whose outer regions may in some cases fragment into neutron-rich clumps that collapse to form subsolar-mass neutron stars. These disk-formed objects can then merge either with one another or, following possibly hierarchical evolution, with the central black hole. In this work, we characterize the gravitational-wave signatures of these binaries, focusing on distinctive features of the collapsar environment: Doppler and other phase modulations from orbital motion about the central black hole, gas-driven migration in the disk, and tidal interactions during inspiral. We show that the combination of anomalously low component masses with these environmental imprints produces unique waveform signatures that can distinguish the collapsar channel from other subsolar merger scenarios. Current and next-generation detectors have good prospects for identifying the intrinsic properties of such objects and, if subsolar mergers are discovered, for testing and constraining the collapsar formation pathway.

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