Related papers: Accretion-Driven Evolution of Black Holes: Eddingt…
We show that black holes grow substantially by accretion at close to Eddington rates. Using a complete sample of soft X-ray selected AGNs, Grupe & Mathur (2004) have shown that narrow line Seyfert 1 galaxies, as a class, lie below the…
We explore the connection between different classes of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) and the evolution of their host galaxies, by deriving host galaxy properties, clustering, and Eddington ratios of AGNs selected in the radio, X-ray, and…
By performing three-dimensional hydrodynamical simulations of a galaxy in an isolated dark matter halo, we follow the evolution of the spin parameter $a$ of a black hole (BH) undergoing super-Eddington phases throughout its growth. This…
Two effects have substantially increased the scatter in the AGN black hole mass - host galaxy bulge luminosity relationship derived from SDSS spectra. The first is that at a fixed black hole mass, the SDSS spectrum depends strongly on…
(abbreviated) We show that there is a limit relation between the black hole mass and the width at the half maximum of H$\beta$ for active galactic nuclei (AGNs) with super-Eddington accretion rates. When a black hole has a super-Eddington…
We study a sample of Herschel-PACS selected galaxies within the GOODS-South and the COSMOS fields in the framework of the PACS Evolutionary Probe (PEP) project. Starting from the rich multi-wavelength photometric data-sets available in both…
Despite their factor of ~10^8 difference in black hole mass, several lines of evidence suggest possible similarities between black hole accretion flows in active galactic nuclei (AGN) and Galactic X-ray binaries. However, it is still…
Using a simple description of feedback from black hole (BH) growth, we develop an analytic model for the fueling of Seyferts (low-luminosity AGN) and their relation to their host galaxies, Eddington ratio distributions, and cosmological…
Active galactic nucleus (AGN) feedback, driven by radiation pressure on dust, is an important mechanism for efficiently coupling the accreting black hole to the surrounding environment. Recent observations confirm that X-ray selected AGN…
We argue that supermassive black hole growth in AGN occurs via sequences of randomly--oriented accretion discs with angular momentum limited by self--gravity. These stably co-- or counter--align with the black hole spin with almost equal…
Our understanding of highly accreting AGNs is hampered by the lack of a complete systematic investigation in terms of their main spectral and variability properties, and by the relative paucity of them in the local Universe, especially…
We study the X-ray variability properties of distant AGNs in the Chandra Deep Field-South region over 17 years, up to $z\sim 4$, and compare them with those predicted by models based on local samples. We use the results of Monte Carlo…
Utilizing cosmological hydrodynamic simulations we show that there is a brief super-Eddington accretion phase in typical halos at high redshift, impervious to AGN self-regulation. However, once having attained a black hole mass of…
The structure of the accretion flow onto supermassive black holes (SMBH) is not well understood. Standard disc models match to zeroth order in predicting substantial energy dissipation within optically-thick material producing a…
The accretion and feedback processes governing supermassive black hole (SMBH) growth span an enormous range of spatial scales, from the Event Horizon to the circumgalactic medium. Recent general relativistic magnetohydrodynamic (GRMHD)…
The importance of feedback (radiative and mechanical) from massive black holes at the centers of elliptical galaxies is not in doubt, given the well established relation among black hole mass and galaxy optical luminosity. Here, with the…
We use results from simulations of the production of magnetohydrodynamic jets around black holes to derive the cosmic spin history of the most massive black holes. We assume that the efficiency of jet production is a monotonic function of…
Understanding the relative roles of large-scale environment and internal host-galaxy processes in shaping AGN activity is essential for constraining models of black-hole growth and galaxy evolution. We investigate how the environment of…
Dense gas in the centre of galaxies feeds massive black holes, but can also become a source of obscuration and limit our ability to find faint Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN). We use a high resolution cosmological radiative hydrodynamics…
The physical and evolutionary relation between growing supermassive black holes (AGN) and host galaxies is currently the subject of intense research activity. Nevertheless, a deep theoretical understanding of such a relation is hampered by…