Related papers: Eclipse Mapping: Astrotomography of Accretion Disc…
We study polarization from scattering of light on a cloud in radial motion along the symmetry axis of an accretion disk. Radiation drag from the disk and gravitational attraction of the central black hole are taken into account, as well as…
When a white dwarf (WD) is weakly magnetized and its accretion disk is thin, accreted material first reaches the WD's surface at its equator. This matter slows its orbit as it comes into co-rotation with the WD, dissipating kinetic energy…
The study of cataclysmic variables (CVs), and in particular of the evolution of their accretion discs throughout their different brightness states, has benefited largely from the use of indirect imaging techniques. I report on the latest…
We construct an analytical black hole accretion disk model that incorporates both magnetic pressure and disk wind, which are found to be important from numerical simulations. A saturated magnetic pressure that relates the Alfven velocity…
We present a new way of looking at the very long term evolution of GRBs in which the disk of material surrounding the putative black hole powering the GRB jet modulates the mass flow, and hence the efficacy of the process that extracts…
The images of supermassive black holes surrounded by optically-thin, radiatively-inefficient accretion flows, like those observed with the Event Horizon Telescope, are characterized by a bright ring of emission surrounding the black-hole…
We propose a new, efficient multi-scale method to decompose a map (or signal in general) into components maps that contain structures of different sizes. In the widely-used wave transform, artifacts containing negative values arise around…
We examine the observational appearance of partial gaps being opened by planets in protoplanetary disks, considering the effects of the inclination relative to the line of sight. The gap's trough is darkened by both shadowing and cooling,…
We study the lamppost model, in which the primary X-ray sources in accreting black-hole systems are located symmetrically on the rotation axis on both sides of the black hole surrounded by an accretion disc. We show the importance of the…
We present a new method to map the surface brightness of the accretion streams in AM Herculis systems from observed light curves. Extensive tests of the algorithm show that it reliably reproduces the intensity distribution of the stream for…
For a slowly rotating non-magnetized white dwarf the accretion disk extends all the way to the star. Here the matter impacts and spreads towards the poles as new matter continuously piles up behind it. We have solved the 3d compressible…
Light orbiting an accreting black hole may impact the disk or jet multiple times before escaping to the observer, at a variety of angles with respect to the local magnetic field. In this letter, we characterize the imprints of these long…
We consider the inward propagation of warping and eccentric disturbances in discs around black holes under a wide variety of conditions. In our calculations we use secular theories of warped and eccentric discs and assume the deformations…
The optical characteristics of three types of black holes (BHs) surrounded by a thin accretion disk are discussed, namely the Schwarzschild BH, Bardeen BH, and Hayward BH. We calculate the deflection angle of light as it traverses the…
The inner radius of the accretion disc around a black hole in the low/hard state can be measured in one of two ways. Firstly, via the extent of broadening of the iron emission line, and secondly, from the luminosity and temperature of the…
An occulter is a large diffracting screen which may be flown in conjunction with a telescope to image extrasolar planets. The edge is shaped to minimize the diffracted light in a region beyond the occulter, and a telescope may be placed in…
When we are fortunate enough to view an exoplanetary system nearly edge-on, the star and planet periodically eclipse each other. Observations of eclipses (transits and occultations) provide a bonanza of information that cannot be obtained…
We report on the detection of infrared light from the super-Earth 55 Cnc e, based on four occultations obtained with Warm Spitzer at 4.5 microns. Our data analysis consists of a two-part process. In a first step, we perform individual…
We investigate the photon-trapping effects in the super-critical black hole accretion flows by solving radiation transfer as well as the energy equations of radiation and gas. It is found that the slim-disk model generally overestimates the…
The projection effect of an anisotropic accretion disk causes its electromagnetic radiation to depend on the emission angle. Although this dependency has the potential to influence the observational characteristics of black holes, it has…