The MandelZoom project – II. The impact of stellar feedback on black hole accretion through an α-disc in dwarf galaxies with a resolved interstellar medium

Abstract

ABSTRACT We present a suite of high-resolution simulations to study how different stellar feedback channels regulate the growth of central intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs) in dwarf galaxies hosting nuclear star clusters. We employ a super-Lagrangian refinement scheme to resolve the self-gravity radius of the $\alpha$-accretion disc ($\lt 0.01$ pc) and follow the gas inflows from the interstellar medium (ISM) to the black hole (BH), allowing for the self-consistent emergence of circumnuclear discs (CNDs). In the absence of stellar feedback, as expected, the galactic disc fragments excessively, producing a massive CND. When radiative stellar feedback is included, fragmentation is suppressed, with even more massive CNDs forming and feeding the IMBH. With supernova (SN) feedback only, clustered SNe strongly heat the ISM, yielding both the lowest CND masses and BH accretion rates. When both radiative stellar feedback and SNe are included, the CND becomes intermittent: it survives for 10–100 Myr, and is then destroyed by feedback before being replenished by fresh galactic inflows, while substantial BH growth still takes place. These results highlight the critical importance of accurately modelling the combined effects of key stellar feedback processes to understand IMBH growth. Our simulation suite brackets the likely range of CND states, with IMBHs exhibiting significant growth and systematic spin-up in all dwarf galaxy models explored. These findings bode well for the detection of IMBHs with future observational facilities such as SKA, the Rubin Observatory, and LISA, and make them highly relevant progenitor candidates of the high-redshift supermassive BHs observed by James Webb Space Telescope.