Related papers: Accretion Disks, Jets and Blazar Variability
Blazars are highly variable active galactic nuclei which emit radiation at all wavelengths from radio to gamma-rays. Polarized radiation from blazars is one key piece of evidence for synchrotron radiation at low energies and it also varies…
Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN), such as Seyfert galaxies, quasars, etc., show light variations in all wavelength bands, with various amplitude and in many time scales. The variations usually look erratic, not periodic nor purely random. Many…
The optical-ultraviolet continuum from active galactic nuclei (AGN) seem to originate from optically thick and/or thin disks, and occasionally from associated circumnuclear starburst regions. These different possible origins can, in…
We analyze the variability of the parsec-scale jet directions in active galactic nuclei (AGNs). Our analysis involves 317 AGNs at frequencies ranging from 2 to 43 GHz, and is made possible by developing an automatic inner jet direction…
We performed a comprehensive analysis of flux and color variability in a redshift-matched sample of Seyfert galaxies, comprising 23 gamma-ray-detected narrow-line Seyfert 1 galaxies (gNLS1s), 190 non-gamma-ray-detected narrow-line Seyfert 1…
In this presentation, we report the results of intraday variability in the optical (BVRI bands) and hard X-ray band (3-79 keV) in a number of blazars. In the optical microvariability studies of the blazars S5 0716+714 and BL Lac, we…
Significant positional offsets of the value from 1 mas to more than 10 mas were found previously between radio (VLBI) and optical (Gaia) positions of active galactic nuclei (AGN). They happen preferentially parallel to the parsec-scale jet…
Low-luminosity active galactic nuclei (LLAGNs) are generally believed to be powered by an inner radiatively inefficient, advection-dominated accretion flow (ADAF), an outer truncated thin disk, and a jet. Maoz (2007) recently challenged…
Gamma-ray flares from Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) show substantial variability on ultrafast timescales (i.e. shorter than the light crossing time of the AGN's supermassive black hole). We propose that ultrafast variability is a byproduct…
The $Fermi$ blazar observations show a strong correlation between $\gamma$-ray luminosities and spectral indices. BL Lac objects are less luminous with harder spectra than flat-spectrum radio quasars (FSRQs). Interestingly FSRQs are evident…
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…
We discuss the implications of rapid (few-minute) variability in the TeV flux of blazars, which has been observed recently with the HESS and MAGIC telescopes. The variability timescales seen in PKS 2155-304 and Mrk 501 are much shorter than…
The past 20 years have seen phenomenal progress in our understanding of BL Lac objects. They form part of the blazar class, which are radio-loud AGN whose relativistic jets are aligned along our line of sight. Several critical milestones…
The relation between accretion disc (thermal emission) and jet (non-thermal emission) in blazars is still a mystery as, typically, the beamed jet emission swamps the disc even in the ultraviolet band where disc emission peaks. In this paper…
Accretion disks around supermassive black holes in active galactic nuclei produce continuum radiation at ultraviolet and optical wavelengths. Physical processes in the accretion flow lead to stochastic variability of this emission on a wide…
The jets observed to emanate from many compact accreting objects may arise from the twisting of a magnetic field threading a differentially rotating accretion disk which acts to magnetically extract angular momentum and energy from the…
We reexamine the hypothesis that the optical/UV/soft X-ray continuum of Active Galactic Nuclei is thermal emission from an accretion disk. Previous studies have shown that fitting the spectra with the standard, optically thick and…
Hard X-ray observations are crucial to study the non-thermal jet emission from high-redshift, powerful blazars. We observed two bright z>2 flat spectrum radio quasars (FSRQs) in hard X-rays to explore the details of their relativistic jets…
We consider the shock structures that can arise in blazar jets as a consequence of variations in the jet flow velocity. There are two possible cases: (1) A double shock system consisting of both a forward and reverse shock (2) A single…
I briefly review the theoretical models of radiatively efficient, geometrically thin and optically thick accretion disk spectra that currently exist for AGN. I then discuss three recent observational developments that have real potential to…