Related papers: Black Hole Candidates
Some of the theoretical challenges posed by the general relativistic description of binary systems of compact objects (neutron stars or black holes) are reviewed. We recall the various ways one can use the theory of the motion, and of the…
Stellar-mass black holes are discovered in X-ray emitting binary systems, where their mass can be determined from the dynamics of their companion stars. Models of stellar evolution have difficulty producing black holes in close binaries…
Type I X-ray bursts are very common in neutron star X-ray binaries, but no Type I burst has been seen in the dozen or so binaries in which the accreting compact star is too massive to be a neutron star and therefore is identified as a black…
Stellar-mass black holes (BHs), with masses comparable to stars, are a major constituent of our Milky Way galaxy. This chapter describes the landscape of challenging, and long-sought efforts to identify these objects in the Galaxy. The…
Most dynamically confirmed stellar-mass black holes and the candidates were originally selected from X-ray outbursts. In the present work, we search for black hole candidates in the LAMOST survey by using the spectra along with photometry…
We examine the distribution of masses of black holes in transient low mass X-ray binary systems. A Bayesian analysis suggests that it is probable that six of the seven systems with measured mass functions have black hole masses clustered…
Massive black hole binaries are naturally predicted in the context of the hierarchical model of structure formation. The binaries that manage to lose most of their angular momentum can coalesce to form a single remnant. In the last stages…
Accreting black holes are unique tools to understand the physics under extreme gravity. While black hole X-ray binaries differ vastly in mass from AGN, their accretion and ejection flows are assumed to be essentially similar. Black hole…
It is widely believed that the spin of black holes in X-ray binaries is mainly natal. A significant spin-up from accretion is not possible. If the secondary has a low mass, the black hole spin cannot change too much even if the black hole…
Detectability of isolated black holes (IBHs) without a companion star but emitting X-rays by accretion from dense interstellar medium (ISM) or molecular cloud gas is investigated. We calculate orbits of IBHs in the Galaxy to derive a…
So far essentially all black hole masses in X-ray binaries have been obtained by observing the companion star's velocity and light curves as functions of the orbital phase. However a major uncertainty is the estimate of the orbital…
We review the state of the evidence for the existence and observational appearance of supermassive black hole binaries. Such objects are expected from standard hierarchical galaxy evolution to form after two galaxies, each containing a…
We have analyzed the observed radial-velocity curve for the X-ray binary M33 X-7 in a Roche model. We have analyzed the dependence between the component masses and the degree of filling of the optical star's Roche lobe to obtain the ratio…
X-ray Binaries (XRBs) consist of a compact object that accretes material from an orbiting secondary star. The most secure method we have for determining if the compact object is a black hole is to determine its mass: this is limited to…
Masses of black holes in nearby galactic nuclei can be measured in a variety of ways, using stellar and gaseous kinematics. Reliable black hole masses are known for several dozen objects, so that demographic questions can start to be…
Globular star clusters contain thousands to millions of old stars packed within a region only tens of light years across. Their high stellar densities make it very probable that their member stars will interact or collide. There has been…
X-ray astronomy is closely related to the study of black hole sources. The discovery that some unseen objects, more massive than any degenerate star, emit huge amounts of X-rays helped accept the concept that back holes are present in X-ray…
Mass distribution of black holes identified through X-ray emission suggests a paucity of black holes in the mass range of 3 to 5 solar masses. Modified theories have been devised to explain this mass gap, and it is suggested that natal…
In this note we suggest that high-mass black holes; i.e., black holes of several solar masses, can be formed in binaries with low-mass main-sequence companions, provided that the hydrogen envelope of the massive star is removed in common…
Supermassive black holes are nowadays believed to reside in most local galaxies. Accretion of gas and black hole mergers play a fundamental role in determining the two parameters defining a black hole: mass and spin. I briefly review here…