On the detectability of gravitational waves emitted from head-on collisions of $$\ell $$-boson stars

Abstract In this work, we examine head-on collisions, produced by other work, of $$\ell $$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>ℓ</mml:mi> </mml:math> -boson stars, potential candidates for dark matter compact objects. We begin with a review of the general properties and features of these stars, leveraging results from prior studies to analyze the gravitational wave signals generated by such collisions. Considering a maximum distance of 100 Mpc for potential events, we identify the range of scalar field masses and frequencies for these stars that would render the gravitational waves detectable by current gravitational wave observatories. The ranges obtained for the scalar field masses are $$m_\phi \,c^2 \in [10^{-15}, 10^{-10}]$$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mrow> <mml:msub> <mml:mi>m</mml:mi> <mml:mi>ϕ</mml:mi> </mml:msub> <mml:mspace/> <mml:msup> <mml:mi>c</mml:mi> <mml:mn>2</mml:mn> </mml:msup> <mml:mo>∈</mml:mo> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>[</mml:mo> <mml:msup> <mml:mn>10</mml:mn> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>-</mml:mo> <mml:mn>15</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msup> <mml:mo>,</mml:mo> <mml:msup> <mml:mn>10</mml:mn> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>-</mml:mo> <mml:mn>10</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msup> <mml:mo>]</mml:mo> </mml:mrow> </mml:mrow> </mml:math> eV. Additionally, we process the resulting signals to generate simulated observatory images, highlighting their similarities and differences compared to those produced by black hole collisions.