Related papers: Radiation Feedback in Hot Accretion-Disk Corona Mo…
Within the disk-corona model, it is natural to expect that a fraction of reflection photons from the disk are Compton scattered by the hot corona (reflection Comptonization), even if this effect is usually ignored in X-ray reflection…
Hard X-rays observed in Active Galactic Nuclei (AGNs) are thought to originate from the Comptonization of the optical/UV accretion disk photons in a hot corona. Polarization studies of these photons can help to constrain the corona geometry…
Thermal conduction between a cool accretion disk and a hot inner corona can result in either evaporation of the disk or condensation of the hot corona. At low mass accretion rates, evaporation dominates and can completely remove the inner…
Understanding the nature of the accretion disk, its interplay with the X-ray corona, and assessing black hole spin demographics are some open challenges in astrophysics. In this work, we examine the predictions of the standard $\alpha$-disk…
We extend our models of the vertical structure and emergent radiation field of accretion disks around supermassive black holes described in previous papers of this series. Our models now include both a self-consistent treatment of Compton…
The condensation of matter from a corona to a cool, optically thick inner disk is investigated for black hole X-ray transient systems in the low hard state. A description of a simple model for the exchange of energy and mass between corona…
The current status of understanding of the X-ray emission from Seyfert galaxies involves Comptonization of soft photons by hot subrelativistic electrons. After briefly reviewing the early theoretical basis for the presence of hot optically…
The X-ray emitting corona irradiates and ionises the surface of the inner accretion disc in Active Galactic Nuclei (AGNs). The ionisation parameter of the inner disc at a radius $r$ from the black hole, $\xi(r)$, can be used to infer…
We study an accretion disc with a hot continuous corona. We assume that the corona itself accretes and therefore it is powered directly by the release of the gravitational energy and cooled by radiative interaction with the disc. We…
The soft X-ray excess in the spectra of active galactic nuclei is characterized by similar electron temperatures of 0.1 -- 0.3 keV and similar photon indices around 2.2 -- 3, if fitted with inverse Comptonization. It remains a puzzle why…
We study in detail the properties of the accreting corona model for active galactic nuclei and galactic black holes. In this model the fraction of the energy liberated in the corona at a given radius is calculated from the global parameters…
The geometry of the accretion flow around stellar mass and supermassive black holes depends on the accretion rate. Broad iron emission lines originating from the irradiation of cool matter can indicate that there is an inner disk below a…
(truncated version) The X-ray spectra of Galactic binary systems in the very high state show both strong disk emission and a strong, steep tail to high energies. We use simultaneous optical-ASCA-RXTE data from the black hole transient XTE…
For accreting black holes (BHs), the lamp-post scenario is a simple and popular model: a hot and point-like corona is located above the black hole, irradiating the accretion disk with hard X-ray radiation, which is believed to be generated…
We present the analysis of several observations of the black hole binary GX 339--4 during its bright intermediate states from two different outbursts (2002 and 2004), as observed by RXTE/PCA. We perform a consistent study of its reflection…
A long-standing question in active galactic nucleus (AGN) research is how the corona is heated up to produce X-ray radiation much stronger than that arising from the viscous heating within the corona. In this paper, we carry out detailed…
We present new calculations of X-ray polarization from accreting black holes (BHs), using a Monte-Carlo ray-tracing code in full general relativity. In our model, an optically thick disk in the BH equatorial plane produces thermal seed…
We calculate the structure of a standard accretion disk with corona surrounding a massive Kerr black hole in general relativistic frame, in which the corona is assumed to be heated by the reconnection of the strongly buoyant magnetic fields…
Continuum and reflection spectral models have each been widely employed in measuring the spins of accreting black holes. However, the two approaches have not been implemented together in a photon-conserving, self-consistent framework. We…
A large fraction of accreting black hole and neutron stars systems present clear evidence of the reprocessing of X-rays in the atmosphere of an optically-thick accretion disk. The main hallmarks of X-ray reflection include fluorescent…