Related papers: Relativistic jets: an overview of recent progress
Relativistic jets of active galactic nuclei have been known to exist for 100 years. Blazars with their jet pointing close to our line of sight are some of the most variable and extreme objects in the universe, showing emission from radio to…
Blazars and Gamma Ray Bursts (GRBs) are the fastest objects known so far. The radiation we see from these sources originates in a jet of similar aperture angle, and we think it is the result of the conversion of some of the jet kinetic…
We have not identified for sure what is the mechanism launching, accelerating and collimating relativistic jets. The two most likely possibilities are the gravitational energy of the accreting matter or the rotational energy of a spinning…
The relativistic outflows from gamma-ray bursts are now thought to be narrowly collimated into jets. After correcting for this jet geometry there is a remarkable constancy of both the energy radiated by the burst and the kinetic energy…
Extragalactic jets are the most powerful persistent sources of the universe. Those pointing at us are called blazars. Their relativistically boosted emission extends from radio frequencies to TeV energies. They are also suspected to be the…
Gamma-ray bursts are the most luminous and probably the most relativistic events in the universe. The last few years have seen a tremendous increase in our knowledge of these events, but the source of the bursts still remains elusive. I…
Blazars, a subset of powerful active galactic nuclei, feature relativistic jets that shine in a broadband electromagnetic radiation, e. g. from radio to TeV emission. Here I present the results of the studies that explore gamma-ray and…
There are several lines of evidence indicating that the ultra-relativistic outflows powering gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are collimated into narrow jets. However, these are indirect, and the jet structure is rather poorly constrained. What is…
Recent observational and theoretical results on blazars are presented and discussed. We are beginning to understand the rich phenomenology of blazars, and we are finding trends which will hopefully lead us to unveil the physics of these…
BeppoSAX is best known for its role in the disclosure of the Gamma-Ray Burst mystery, but it has also improved our understanding of jetted sources in general, and blazars in particular. On the interpretational side, we are curious to see if…
Collimated outflows (jets) appear to be a ubiquitous phenomenon associated with the accretion of material onto a compact object. Despite this ubiquity, many fundamental physics aspects of jets are still poorly understood and constrained.…
Relativistic jets are one of the most powerful manifestations of the release of energy related to the supermassive black holes at the centre of active galactic nuclei (AGN). Their emission is observed across the entire electromagnetic…
Being dominated by non-thermal emission from aligned relativistic jets, blazars allow us to elucidate the physics of extragalactic jets, and, ultimately, how energy is extracted from the central black hole. Crucial information about jet…
Blazars are thought to possess a relativistic jet that is pointing toward the direction of the Earth and the elect of relativistic beaming enhances its apparent brightness. They radiate in all wavebands from the radio to the gamma-ray bands…
The extragalactic gamma-ray sky is dominated by two classes of sources: Gamma-Ray Bursts (GRBs) and radio loud active galactic nuclei whose jets are pointing at us (blazars). We believe that the radiation we receive from them originates…
The Fermi, Swift and INTEGRAL satellites, together with ground based (especially Cherenkov) telescopes made possible a great progress in our understanding of relativistic jets. We can now start to attack the difficult questions of jet…
The power of blazar jets rivals the power that gravity can extract from accreting matter. The mechanism launching and accelerating jets can be considered as the most efficient engine operating in radio--loud sources. It is still a matter of…
The multiwavelength spectra of blazars appear to be dominated by nonthermal emission from a relativistic jet oriented close to the line of sight. The recent detection of many blazars at gamma-ray energies strongly supports this scenario.…
The radiation we observe from blazars is most likely the product of the transformation of bulk kinetic energy into random energy. This process must have a relatively small efficiency (e.g. 10%) if jets are to power the extended…
The radiation observed by blazars is believed to originate from the transformation of bulk kinetic energy of relativistic jets into random energy. A simple way to achieve this is to have an intermittent central power source, producing…