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Cackett EM, Bentz MC, Kara E. Reverberation mapping of active galactic nuclei: from X-ray corona to dusty torus. iScience 2021; 24:102557. [PMID: 34151226 PMCID: PMC8188568 DOI: 10.1016/j.isci.2021.102557] [Citation(s) in RCA: 25] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/19/2022] Open
Abstract
The central engines of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) are powered by accreting supermassive black holes, and while AGNs are known to play an important role in galaxy evolution, the key physical processes occur on scales that are too small to be resolved spatially (aside from a few exceptional cases). Reverberation mapping is a powerful technique that overcomes this limitation by using echoes of light to determine the geometry and kinematics of the central regions. Variable ionizing radiation from close to the black hole drives correlated variability in surrounding gas/dust but with a time delay due to the light travel time between the regions, allowing reverberation mapping to effectively replace spatial resolution with time resolution. Reverberation mapping is used to measure black hole masses and to probe the innermost X-ray emitting region, the UV/optical accretion disk, the broad emission line region, and the dusty torus. In this article, we provide an overview of the technique and its varied applications.
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Affiliation(s)
- Edward M. Cackett
- Department of Physics & Astronomy, Wayne State University, 666 W. Hancock Street, Detroit, MI 48201, USA
- Corresponding author
| | - Misty C. Bentz
- Department of Physics & Astronomy, Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA 30303, USA
| | - Erin Kara
- MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA
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Kara E, Steiner JF, Fabian AC, Cackett EM, Uttley P, Remillard RA, Gendreau KC, Arzoumanian Z, Altamirano D, Eikenberry S, Enoto T, Homan J, Neilsen J, Stevens AL. The corona contracts in a black-hole transient. Nature 2019; 565:198-201. [PMID: 30626944 DOI: 10.1038/s41586-018-0803-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 119] [Impact Index Per Article: 23.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/09/2018] [Accepted: 10/17/2018] [Indexed: 11/09/2022]
Abstract
The geometry of the accretion flow around stellar-mass black holes can change on timescales of days to months1-3. When a black hole emerges from quiescence (that is, it 'turns on' after accreting material from its companion) it has a very hard (high-energy) X-ray spectrum produced by a hot corona4,5 positioned above its accretion disk, and then transitions to a soft (lower-energy) spectrum dominated by emission from the geometrically thin accretion disk, which extends to the innermost stable circular orbit6,7. Much debate persists over how this transition occurs and whether it is driven largely by a reduction in the truncation radius of the disk8,9 or by a reduction in the spatial extent of the corona10,11. Observations of X-ray reverberation lags in supermassive black-hole systems12,13 suggest that the corona is compact and that the disk extends nearly to the central black hole14,15. Observations of stellar-mass black holes, however, reveal equivalent (mass-scaled) reverberation lags that are much larger16, leading to the suggestion that the accretion disk in the hard-X-ray state of stellar-mass black holes is truncated at a few hundreds of gravitational radii from the black hole17,18. Here we report X-ray observations of the black-hole transient MAXI J1820+07019,20. We find that the reverberation time lags between the continuum-emitting corona and the irradiated accretion disk are 6 to 20 times shorter than previously seen. The timescale of the reverberation lags shortens by an order of magnitude over a period of weeks, whereas the shape of the broadened iron K emission line remains remarkably constant. This suggests a reduction in the spatial extent of the corona, rather than a change in the inner edge of the accretion disk.
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Affiliation(s)
- E Kara
- University of Maryland, College Park, MD, USA. .,NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, USA. .,Joint Space Science Institute, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, USA. .,MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research, Cambridge, MA, USA.
| | - J F Steiner
- MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research, Cambridge, MA, USA
| | | | - E M Cackett
- Wayne State University, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Detroit, MI, USA
| | - P Uttley
- Anton Pannekoek Institute for Astronomy, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
| | - R A Remillard
- MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research, Cambridge, MA, USA
| | - K C Gendreau
- NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, USA
| | - Z Arzoumanian
- NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, USA
| | - D Altamirano
- School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK
| | - S Eikenberry
- Department of Astronomy, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA.,Department of Physics, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA
| | - T Enoto
- Hakubi Center for Advanced Research and Department of Astronomy, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
| | - J Homan
- Eureka Scientific, Oakland, CA, USA.,SRON, Netherlands Institute for Space Research, Utrecht, The Netherlands
| | - J Neilsen
- Villanova University, Department of Physics, Villanova, PA, USA
| | - A L Stevens
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA
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