Measuring the spins of accreting black holes
From MaRDI portal
Publication:3014018
Abstract: A typical galaxy is thought to contain tens of millions of stellar-mass black holes, the collapsed remnants of once massive stars, and a single nuclear supermassive black hole. Both classes of black holes accrete gas from their environments. The accreting gas forms a flattened orbiting structure known as an accretion disk. During the past several years, it has become possible to obtain measurements of the spins of the two classes of black holes by modeling the X-ray emission from their accretion disks. Two methods are employed, both of which depend upon identifying the inner radius of the accretion disk with the innermost stable circular orbit (ISCO), whose radius depends only on the mass and spin of the black hole. In the Fe K method, which applies to both classes of black holes, one models the profile of the relativistically-broadened iron line with a special focus on the gravitationally redshifted red wing of the line. In the continuum-fitting method, which has so far only been applied to stellar-mass black holes, one models the thermal X-ray continuum spectrum of the accretion disk. We discuss both methods, with a strong emphasis on the continuum-fitting method and its application to stellar-mass black holes. Spin results for eight stellar-mass black holes are summarized. These data are used to argue that the high spins of at least some of these black holes are natal, and that the presence or absence of relativistic jets in accreting black holes is not entirely determined by the spin of the black hole.
Recommendations
- The spin of supermassive black holes
- The X-ray spectra of accreting Kerr black holes
- Spin and mass of the nearest supermassive black hole
- A short review of relativistic iron lines from stellar-mass black holes
- Observational evidences for spinning black holes: a proof of general relativity for spacetime around rotating black holes
Cited in
(21)- A short review of relativistic iron lines from stellar-mass black holes
- Relativistic sonic geometry for isothermal accretion in the Schwarzschild metric
- Discovery of black hole spindown in the BATSE catalogue of long GRBs
- Circular geodesic of Bardeen and Ayon–Beato–Garcia regular black-hole and no-horizon spacetimes
- Lux in obscuro: photon orbits of extremal black holes revisited
- Observational evidences for spinning black holes: a proof of general relativity for spacetime around rotating black holes
- Test of the string loop oscillation model using kHz quasiperiodic oscillations in a neutron star binary
- Testing general relativity with black hole X-ray data: a progress report
- Spinning gravitating objects in the effective field theory in the post-Newtonian scheme
- Superradiant instability of the Kerr brane
- Spin and mass of the nearest supermassive black hole
- The stochastic gravitational-wave background in the absence of horizons
- Relativistic sonic geometry for isothermal accretion in the Kerr metric
- Constraining the generalized uncertainty principle through black hole shadow, S2 star orbit, and quasiperiodic oscillations
- Spin of the M87 Black Hole
- Kerr black holes are not fragile
- How to measure a black hole’s mass, spin, and direction of spin axis in the Kerr lens effect 1: Test case with simple source emission near a black hole
- The spin of supermassive black holes
- The evolution of compact binary star systems
- Refining the fundamental plane of accreting black holes
- Astrophysical black holes: evidence of a horizon?
This page was built for publication: Measuring the spins of accreting black holes
Report a bug (only for logged in users!)Click here to report a bug for this page (MaRDI item Q3014018)
