We're using black hole collisions as giant, cosmic laboratories to figure out how nuclear reactions work inside stars.
March 23, 2026
Original Paper
Constraints on the $^{12}$C$(α, γ)^{16}$O and $^{16}$O+$^{16}$O Reaction Rates from Binary Black Holes Detected via Gravitational Wave Signals
arXiv · 2603.19883
The Takeaway
By analyzing the 'ripples' in spacetime from black hole mergers, researchers can work backwards to calculate the speed of atomic fusion inside the giant stars that died to create them. This connects the largest objects in the universe to the tiniest subatomic processes.
From the abstract
Gravitational-wave observations of binary black hole (BH) mergers provide a novel avenue for testing massive-star evolution and the resulting BH mass spectrum. Recent population analyses under the hierarchical-merger hypothesis have offered evidence for the BH mass gap and inferred its lower edge to $\sim 44 - 68$ M$_\odot$. Motivated by these findings, we compute low-metallicity ($Z=10^{-5}$) helium star models with MESA and systematically explore the effect of uncertainties in the $^{12}$C$(\a