Related papers: Spinning Black Holes in Active Galactic Nuclei
The spectrum of the bright Seyfert I galaxy MCG-6-30-15 shows a broad Fe K-alpha emission line, generally interpreted to originate very close to the central black hole which must then have a high spin. The observed X-ray variability is…
We report on the iron K-alpha line properties of a sample of Seyfert galaxies observed with the XMM-Newton EPIC pn instrument. Using a systematic and uniform analysis, we find that complexity at iron-K is extremely common in the XMM…
We present an analysis of the 2-10keV XMM-Newton/EPIC-pn spectrum of the Seyfert-1 galaxy NGC4593. Apart from the presence of two narrow emission lines corresponding to the Kalpha lines of cold and hydrogen-like iron, this spectrum…
We address the ability of broad iron emission lines from black hole accretion disks to diagnose the spin of the black hole. Using a high-resolution 3-dimensional MHD simulation of a geometrically-thin accretion disk in a Pseudo-Newtonian…
We report results obtained from six XMM-Newton observations of the Seyfert galaxy 1H 0419-577. Here we show that the X-ray spectrum and variability are well described by a two-component model comprising a power law with constant spectral…
In the local Galactic interstellar medium there is approximate energy equipartition between cosmic rays, magnetic fields and radiation. If this holds in the central regions of AGN, in particular Seyfert galaxies, then consideral nuclear…
X-ray reflection off the accretion disc surrounding a black hole, together with the associated broad iron K$\alpha$ line, has been widely used to constrain the innermost accretion-flow geometry and black hole spin. Some recent measurements…
We show that it is possible to explain the physical origin of jet precession in active galactic nuclei (AGNs) through the misalignment between the rotation axes of the accretion disk and of the Kerr black hole. We apply this scenario to…
Spectral features can arise by reflection of coronal X-rays on a black hole accretion disc. The resulting profile bears various imprints of strong gravitational field acting on the light emitting gas. The observed shape of the reflection…
The X-ray spectra of luminous Seyfert 1 galaxies often appear to be reflection dominated. In a number of Narrow Line Seyfert 1 (NLS1) galaxies and galactic black holes in the very high state, the variability of the continuum and of the iron…
The broad-line radio galaxy 3C120 is a powerful source of both X-ray and radio emission including superluminal jet outflows. We report on our reanalysis of 160 ks of Suzaku data taken in 2006, previously examined by Kataoka et al. (2007).…
The observed iron K-alpha fluorescence lines in Seyfert galaxies provide strong evidence for an accretion disk near a supermassive black hole as a source of the line emission. Previous studies of line emission have considered only…
MCG-6-30-15, at a distance of 37 Mpc (z=0.008), is the archetypical Seyfert 1 galaxy showing very broad Fe K$\alpha$ emission. We present results from a joint NuSTAR and XMM-Newton observational campaign that, for the first time, allows a…
We discuss some topical issues related to the Fe K emission lines in AGNs. We show remarkable agreement between non-contemporaneous ASCA and Chandra grating data and explain why there has been terrible confusion about the ASCA and post-ASCA…
XMM-Newton observations of type I AGN are presented. The properties of the iron K emission line are reviewed, the majority of AGN observed by XMM-Newton show narrow, unresolved (by XMM) iron lines at 6.4 keV from cold matter that must…
In active galactic nuclei, X-ray illumination of the accretion disk around a supermassive black hole (SMBH) results in the production of the K$\alpha$ fluorescent line of iron, which provides insights into accretion physics and SMBH spins.…
Several AGN and black hole X-ray binaries show a clear very broad iron line which is strong evidence that the black holes are rapidly spinning. Detailed analysis of these objects shows that the emission line is not significantly affected by…
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…
A tight correlation of black hole mass and central velocity dispersion has been found recently for both active and quiescent galaxies. By applying this correlation, we develop a simple method to derive the inclination angles for a sample of…
We analyzed simultaneous archival XMM-Newton and RXTE observations of the X-ray binary and black hole candidate Swift J1753.5-0127. In a previous analysis of the same data a soft thermal component was found in the X-ray spectrum, and the…