Aligning Nuclear Cluster Orbits with an Active Galactic Nucleus
  Accretion Disk
  Active galactic nuclei (AGN) are powered by the accretion of disks of gas
onto supermassive black holes (SMBHs). Stars and stellar remnants orbiting the
SMBH in the nuclear star cluster (NSC) will interact with the AGN disk.
Orbiters plunging through the disk experience a drag force and, through
repeated passage, can have their orbits captured by the disk. A population of
embedded objects in AGN disks may be a significant source of binary black hole
mergers, supernovae, tidal disruption events and embedded gamma-ray bursts. For
two representative AGN disk models we use geometric drag and
Bondi-Hoyle-Littleton drag to determine the time to capture for stars and
stellar remnants. We assume a range of initial inclination angles and
semi-major axes for circular Keplerian prograde orbiters. Capture time strongly
depends on the density and aspect ratio of the chosen disk model, the relative
velocity of the stellar object with respect to the disk, and the AGN lifetime.
We expect that for an AGN disk density $\rho \gtrsim 10^{-11}\rm g/cm^3$ and
disk lifetime $\geq 1$Myr, there is a significant population of embedded
stellar objects, which can fuel mergers detectable in gravitational waves with
LIGO-Virgo and LISA.
