Tidal disruption rates in non-spherical galactic nuclei formed by galaxy
  mergers
  We explore the rates of tidal disruption events (TDEs) of stars by
supermassive black holes (SBHs) in galactic nuclei formed in mergers followed
by a formation and coalescence of a binary SBH. Such systems initially have a
deficit of stars on low-angular-momentum orbits caused by the slingshot process
during the binary SBH stage, which tends to reduce the flux of stars into the
SBH compared to the steady-state value. On the other hand, a newly formed
galactic nucleus has a non-spherical shape which enhances the mixing of stars
in angular momentum and thus the TDE rate. In galaxies with relatively low SBH
masses (<10^7 Msun), relaxation times are short enough to wash out the
anisotropy in initial conditions, and for more massive SBH the enhancement of
flux due to non-sphericity turns out to be more important than its suppression
due to initial anisotropy. Therefore, the present-day TDE rates generally
exceed conventional steady-state estimates based on a spherical isotropic
approximation. We thus conjecture that the lower observationally inferred TDE
rates compared to theoretical predictions cannot be attributed to the depletion
of low-angular-momentum stars by SBH binaries.
