Related papers: Probing Strong Gravitational Fields in X-ray Novae
Within Einstein's theory of gravity, any compact object heavier than a few solar masses must be a black hole. Any observation showing otherwise would imply either new physics beyond General Relativity or new exotic matter fields beyond the…
Stars with an initial mass more than ~25 Msun are thought to ultimately become black holes. Then stellar-mass black holes should be ubiquitous but fewer than 20 have been found in our Galaxy to date, all of which have been found through…
Ultralight bosonic fields are compelling dark-matter candidates and arise in a variety of beyond-Standard-Model scenarios. These fields can tap energy and angular momentum from spinning black holes through superradiant instabilities, during…
The existence of black holes and of spacetime singularities is a fundamental issue in science. Despite this, observations supporting their existence are scarce, and their interpretation unclear. We overview how strong a case for black holes…
Gravitational waves from inspiraling sub-solar mass compact objects would provide almost definitive evidence for the existence of primordial black holes. In this chapter, we explain why these exotic objects are interesting candidates for…
This paper reviews the X-ray, optical, radio and IR observations of galactic X-ray binaries suspected to contain black hole compact objects, with particular emphasis on the supporting dynamical evidence.
Two strands of observational gravitation, one the search for astrophysical evidence of primordial black holes and the other the search for gravitational waves, may combine to provide strong evidence in favour of cosmological models based on…
The defining characteristic of a black hole is that it possesses an event horizon through which matter and energy can fall in but from which nothing escapes. Soft X-ray transients (SXTs), a class of X-ray binaries, appear to confirm this…
The direct detection of gravitational waves opens new perspectives for measuring properties of gravitationally bound compact objects. It is then important to investigate black holes and neutron stars in alternative theories of gravity,…
We construct gravitational atoms including self-gravity, obtaining solutions of the Einstein-Klein-Gordon equations for a scalar field surrounding a non-rotating black hole in a quasi-stationary approximation. We resolve the region near the…
A supermassive black hole moving through a field of stars will gravitationally scatter the stars, inducing a backreaction force on the black hole known as dynamical friction. In Newtonian gravity, the axisymmetry of the system about the…
X-ray signatures of outflowing gas have been detected in several accreting black-hole binaries, always in the soft state. A key question raised by these observations is whether these winds might also exist in the hard state. Here, we carry…
Adopting the strong field limit approach, we investigated the strong gravitational lensing in a Brane-World black hole, which means that the strong field limit coefficients and the deflection angle in this gravitational field are obtained.…
X-ray reflection spectroscopy can be a powerful tool to test the nature of astrophysical black holes. Extending previous work on Kerr black holes with scalar hair [1] and on boson stars [2], here we study whether astrophysical black hole…
The X-ray emission from accreting black-holes and neutron stars features strong variability on sub-second time scales, with very complex and broad phenomenology. From high-frequency quasi-periodic oscillations to rapidly changing X-ray…
Binary systems of rapidly spinning compact objects, such as black holes or neutron stars, are prime targets for gravitational wave astronomers. The dynamics of these systems can be very complicated due to spin-orbit and spin-spin couplings.…
In this paper we have investigated the gravitational lensing phenomenon in the strong field regime for a regular, charged, static, non-linear black hole having a electrodynamics source. We have obtained the angle of deflection and compared…
Relativistic X-ray emission lines from the inner accretion disk around black holes are reviewed. Recent observations with the Chandra X-ray Observatory, X-ray Multi-Mirror Mission-Newton, and Suzaku are revealing these lines to be good…
The inner 20 gravitational radii around the black hole at the centre of luminous Active Galactic Nuclei and stellar mass Black Hole Binaries are now being routinely mapped by X-ray spectral-timing techniques. Spectral blurring and…
Exploring dark matter via observations of extreme astrophysical environments -- defined here as heavy compact objects such as white dwarfs, neutron stars, and black holes, as well as supernovae and compact object merger events -- has been a…