Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-p9bg8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-22T15:26:27.239Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Jets at lowest mass accretion rates

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 February 2011

Dipankar Maitra
Affiliation:
Dept. of Astronomy, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA48109 email: [email protected], [email protected]
Andrew Cantrell
Affiliation:
Dept. of Astronomy, Yale UniversityNew Haven, CT, USA06511 email: [email protected], [email protected]
Sera Markoff
Affiliation:
Astronomical Institute “Anton Pannekoek”, University of Amsterdam 1098 XH Amsterdam, The Netherlands email: [email protected]
Heino Falcke
Affiliation:
Dept. of Astronomy, Radboud University 6500 GL Nijmegen, The Netherlands email: [email protected]
Jon Miller
Affiliation:
Dept. of Astronomy, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA48109 email: [email protected], [email protected]
Charles Bailyn
Affiliation:
Dept. of Astronomy, Yale UniversityNew Haven, CT, USA06511 email: [email protected], [email protected]
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

We present results of recent observations and theoretical modeling of data from black holes accreting at very low luminosities (L/LEdd ≲ 10−8). We discuss our newly developed time-dependent model for episodic ejection of relativistic plasma within a jet framework, and a successful application of this model to describe the origin of radio flares seen in Sgr A*, the Galactic center black hole. Both the observed time lags and size-frequency relationships are reproduced well by the model. We also discuss results from new Spitzer data of the stellar black hole X-ray binary system A0620–00. Complemented by long term SMARTS monitoring, these observations indicate that once the contribution from the accretion disk and the donor star are properly included, the residual mid-IR spectral energy distribution of A0620–00 is quite flat and consistent with a non-thermal origin. The results above suggest that a significant fraction of the observed spectral energy distribution originating near black holes accreting at low luminosities could result from a mildly relativistic outflow. The fact that these outflows are seen in both stellar-mass black holes as well as in supermassive black holes at the heart of AGNs strengthens our expectation that accretion and jet physics scales with mass.

Type
Contributed Papers
Copyright
Copyright © International Astronomical Union 2011

References

Blandford, R. & Begelman, M. 1999, MNRAS, 303, L1CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bower, G. et al. 2004, Science, 304, 704CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cantrell, A. et al. 2008, ApJ, 673, L159CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cantrell, A. et al. 2010, ApJ, 710, 1127CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Doeleman, S. et al. 2008, Nature, 455, 78CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Falcke, H. et al. 2004, A&A, 414, 895Google Scholar
Fender, R. 2006, In “Compact Stellar X-ray Sources”, Cambridge Astrophysics Series, 39, 381CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gallo, E. et al. 2003, MNRAS, 344, 60CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ghez, A. et al. 2008, ApJ, 689, 1044CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gültekin, K. et al. 2009, ApJ, 706, 404CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Homan, J. & Belloni, T. 2005, Ap&SS, 300, 107Google Scholar
Maitra, D. et al. 2009a, MNRAS, 398, 1638CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maitra, D. et al. 2009b, A&A, 508, L13Google Scholar
Markoff, S. et al. 2001, A&A, 372, L25Google Scholar
Merloni, A. et al. 2003, MNRAS, 345, 1057CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Narayan, R. & Yi, I. 1994, ApJ, 428, L13CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reid, M. et al. 2009, ApJ, 700, 137CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Remillard, R. & McClintock, J. 2006, ARA&A, 44, 49Google Scholar
Russell, D. et al. 2010, MNRAS, 405, 1759Google Scholar
Shen, Z.-Q. et al. 2005, Nature, 438, 62CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vila, G. & Romero, G. 2010, MNRAS, 403, 1457CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Yusef-Zadeh, F. et al. 2008, ApJ, 682, 361CrossRefGoogle Scholar