Related papers: Testing general relativity with accretion onto com…
X-ray reflection spectroscopy is potentially a powerful tool to probe the spacetime geometry around astrophysical black holes and test general relativity in the strong field regime. However, precision tests of general relativity are only…
Accreting binaries containing a black hole are stellar systems composed of a normal star and a black hole. Because of the strong gravitational pull of the black hole, matter is removed from the companion star and falls into the compact ob…
Black holes in General Relativity are known as Kerr black holes and are characterized solely by two parameters, the mass $M$ and the spin $J$. All the higher multipole moments of the gravitational field are functions of these two…
Black hole binaries exhibit dramatic changes in their X-ray spectral and timing properties over time, providing important clues about the physical processes that occur in these systems. Black holes and black hole candidates are prime…
Accreting black holes and neutron stars in their hard (low) state show not only very similar X/gamma-ray spectra but also that the behaviour of their light curves is quite similar which can be quantified as having similar power-density…
Einstein's theory of General Relativity is one of the pillars of modern physics. For decades, the theory has been mainly tested in the weak field regime with experiments in the Solar System and observations of binary pulsars. Thanks to a…
Astrophysical tests of general relativity belong to two categories: 1) "internal", i.e. consistency tests within the theory (for example, tests that astrophysical black holes are indeed described by the Kerr solution and its perturbations),…
Relativistic jets from Active Galactic Nuclei are known since decades, but the study of the connection between accretion and ejection in these systems is hampered by the long time scales associated to these events. The past decade has seen…
Despite its success in the weak gravity regime, General Relativity (GR) has yet to be verified in the regime of strong gravity. In this paper, we present the results of detailed ray tracing simulations aiming at clarifying if the combined…
In the past decades, the phenomenology of fast time variations of high-energy flux from black-hole binaries has increased, thanks to the availability of more and more sophisticated space observatories, and a complex picture has emerged.…
We review the properties and behavior X-ray binaries that contain an accreting black hole. The larger majority of such systems are X-ray transients, and many of them were observed in daily pointings with RXTE throughout the course of their…
The X-ray signal from active galactic nuclei and black hole X-ray binaries is highly variable on a range of timescales. This variability can be exploited to map the region of interest close to the black hole, which is far too small to…
Astrophysical black hole candidates are thought to be the Kerr black hole predicted by General Relativity. In order to confirm the Kerr-nature of these objects, we need to probe the geometry of the space-time around them and see if the…
The relativistic broad iron lines seen in the X-ray spectra of several active galaxies and Galactic black hole systems are reviewed. Most such objects require emission from within the innermost stable orbit of a non-rotating black hole,…
We prescribe a method to study the effects of self-gravity of accretion disk around a black hole associated with long Gamma Ray Bursts (GRBs) in an evolving background Kerr metric. This is an extension to our previous work where we…
Special and general relativistic effects on the X-ray emissions, especially the continuum spectra, from the accretion disks around black holes are investigated using the ray-tracing method. Because both the special and general relativistic…
The X-ray emission from accreting black hole (BH) systems displays strong variability. Short reverberation lags are expected between the primary hard X-ray continuum and the reprocessed disc emission. These lags depend on light-travel…
Astrophysical black hole systems are the ideal laboratories for testing Einstein's theory of gravity in the strong field regime. We have recently developed a framework which uses the reflection spectrum of black hole systems to perform…
The spacetime geometry around astrophysical black holes is well approximated by the Kerr metric, but deviations from standard predictions are possible in a number of scenarios beyond Einstein's gravity and in the presence of exotic matter.…
We consider a temporal response of relativistically broadened line spectrum of iron from black hole accretion irradiated by an X-ray echo under strong gravity. The physical condition of accreting gas is numerically calculated in the context…