Gravitational-wave cutoff frequencies of tidally disruptive neutron star-black hole binary mergers

Tidal disruption has a dramatic impact on the outcome of neutron star-black hole mergers. The phenomenology of these systems can be divided in three classes: nondisruptive, mildly disruptive, and disruptive. The cutoff frequency of the gravitational radiation produced during the merger (which is potentially measurable by interferometric detectors) is very different in each regime, and when the merger is disruptive it carries information on the neutron star equation of state. Here we use semianalytical tools to derive a formula for the critical binary mass ratio Q = M-BH/M-NS below which mergers are disruptive as a function of the stellar compactness C = M-NS/R-NS and the dimensionless black hole spin chi. We then employ a new gravitational waveform amplitude model, calibrated to 134 general relativistic numerical simulations of binaries with black hole spin (anti-) aligned with the orbital angular momentum, to obtain a fit to the gravitational-wave cutoff frequency in the disruptive regime as a function of C, Q, and chi. Our findings are important to build gravitational-wave template banks, to determine whether neutron star-black hole mergers can emit electromagnetic radiation (thus helping multimessenger searches), and to improve event rate calculations for these systems.