Testing General Relativity with Black Holes
Abstract
The theory of General Relativity has successfully passed a large number of observational tests. The theory has been extensively tested in the weak-field regime with experiments in the Solar System and observations of binary pulsars. The past 10 years have seen significant advancements in the study of the strong-field regime, which can now be tested with gravitational waves, X-ray data, and black hole imaging. Here I summarize the state-of-the-art of the tests of General Relativity with black hole X-ray data and I briefly discuss the long-term vision of the possibility of an interstellar mission to the closest black hole for more precise and accurate tests.
Cite
@article{arxiv.2508.12269,
title = {Testing General Relativity with Black Holes},
author = {Cosimo Bambi},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2508.12269},
year = {2026}
}
Comments
9 pages, 2 figures. v2: refereed version. Talk given at the International Conference on Theoretical Physics and Astrophysics (ICTPA-2025), 24-28 March 2025, Tashkent, Uzbekistan