GW190521: A Binary Black Hole Merger with a Total Mass of 150 M ⊙
On May 21, 2019 at 03:02:29 UTC Advanced LIGO and Advanced Virgo observed a short duration gravitational-wave signal, GW190521, with a three-detector network signal-to-noise ratio of 14.7, and an estimated false-alarm rate of 1 in 4900 yr using a search sensitive to generic transients. If GW190521 is from a quasicircular binary inspiral, then the detected signal is consistent with the merger of two black holes with masses of 8 5 - 14 + 21 M ⊙ and 6 6 - 18 + 17 M ⊙ (90% credible intervals). We infer that the primary black hole mass lies within the gap produced by (pulsational) pair-instability supernova processes, with only a 0.32% probability of being below 65 M ⊙ . We calculate the mass of the remnant to be 14 2 - 16 + 28 M ⊙ , which can be considered an intermediate mass black hole (IMBH). The luminosity distance of the source is 5.3 - 2.6 + 2.4 Gpc , corresponding to a redshift of 0.82 - 0.34 + 0.28 . The inferred rate of mergers similar to GW190521 is 0.13 - 0.11 + 0.30 Gpc - 3 yr - 1 .