Related papers: Observing Radio Pulsars in the Galactic Centre wit…
We measure the proper motion of the pulsar PSR J1745-2900 relative to the Galactic Center massive black hole, Sgr A*, using the Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA). The pulsar has a transverse velocity of 236 +/- 11 km s^-1 at position angle 22…
Tests of gravity are important to the development of our understanding of gravitation and spacetime. Binary pulsars provide a superb playground for testing gravity theories. In this chapter we pedagogically review the basics behind pulsar…
Pulsars are precision celestial clocks. When being put in a binary, the ticking conveys the secret of underlying spacetime geometrodynamics. We use pulsars to test if the gravitational interaction possesses a tiny deviation from Einstein's…
We propose a simple test for the existence of a cluster of black hole remnants around Sgr A* that is based on a small sample of any type of Galactic Center objects, provided they are substantially less massive than the black holes and…
Pulsar timing, i.e. the analysis of the arrival times of pulses from a pulsar, is a powerful tool in modern astrophysics. It allows us to measure the time delays of an electromagnetic signal caused by a number of physical processes as the…
The S stars near the Galactic centre and any pulsars that may be on similar orbits, can be modelled in a unified way as clocks orbiting a black hole, and hence are potential probes of relativistic effects, including black hole spin. The…
This thesis includes two main projects. In the first part, we assess the feasibility of a recently suggested strong-field general relativity test, in which future observations of a hypothetical class of stars orbiting very close to the…
The center of our galaxy hosts Sagittarius~A*, a supermassive compact object of $\sim 4.3\times 10^6$ solar masses, usually associated with a black hole. Nevertheless, black holes possess a central singularity, considered unphysical, and an…
Pulsars provide a wealth of information about General Relativity, the equation of state of superdense matter, relativistic particle acceleration in high magnetic fields, the Galaxy's interstellar medium and magnetic field, stellar and…
One avenue for testing the no-hair theorem is obtained through timing a pulsar orbiting close to a black hole and fitting for quadrupolar effects on the time-of-arrival of pulses. If deviations from the Kerr quadrupole are measured, then…
The detection of radio pulsars within the central few parsecs of the Galaxy would provide a unique probe of the gravitational and magneto-ionic environments in the Galactic Center (GC) and, if close enough to Sgr A*, precise tests of…
Several stars orbit around a black hole candidate of mass $3.7\times 10^6$ M$_{\odot}$, in the region of the Galactic Center (GC). Looking for General Relativistic (GR) periastron shifts is limited by the existence of a stellar cluster…
Radio timing observations of a millisecond pulsar in orbit around the Galactic centre black hole (BH) or a BH at the centre of globular clusters could answer foundational questions in astrophysics and fundamental physics. Pulsar radio…
Massive black holes (MBHs) exist in the Galactic center (GC) and other nearby galactic nuclei. As natural outcome of galaxy mergers, some MBHs may have a black hole (BH) companion. In this paper, assuming that the MBHs in the GC and some…
Radio-wave scattering is enhanced dramatically for Galactic center sources in a region with radius >~ 15 arc min. Using scattering from Sgr A* and other sources, we show that pulse broadening for pulsars in the Galactic center is {\em at…
Observations of the precessing orbits of stars very near the massive black hole in the galactic center could provide measurements of the spin and quadrupole moment of the hole and thereby test the no-hair theorem of general relativity.…
The center of our Galaxy hosts the best constrained supermassive black hole in the universe, Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*). Its mass and distance have been accurately determined from stellar orbits and proper motion studies, respectively, and its…
In Einstein's general relativity (GR), gravity is described by a massless spin-2 metric field, and the extension of GR to include a mass term for the graviton has profound implication for gravitation and cosmology. Besides the gravity…
Radio pulsars are fascinating and extremely useful objects. Despite our on-going difficulties in understanding the details of their emission physics, they can be used as precise cosmic clocks in a wide-range of experiments -- in particular…
Given sufficient sensitivity, pulsar timing observations can make a direct detection of gravitational waves passing over the Earth. Pulsar timing is most sensitive to gravitational waves with frequencies in the nanoHertz region, with the…