Institute for Advanced Study Astrophysics Seminar

Massive black holes (MBHs) are found in galaxies across a wide mass range and play a central role in regulating gas cooling and star formation through active galactic nucleus (AGN) feedback. Cosmological simulations—where MBHs and galaxies co-evolve in realistic environments—successfully reproduce many facets of MBH-galaxy co-evolution, making them powerful tools to study the growth and evolution of MBHs across cosmic time. However, a key aspect often oversimplified in such models is MBH dynamics, which are typically treated by artificially pinning MBHs to galaxy centers. In this talk, I will highlight recent progress and ongoing challenges in modeling MBH dynamics within cosmological simulations, and demonstrate how their realistic treatment can lead to significant departures from the traditional central-pinning assumption. I will discuss the observational implications of MBHs in motion—including mergers, off-center AGN, and wandering MBHs—and how they can inform current and future observations.