[en] Although recent work in numerical relativity has made tremendous strides in quantifying the gravitational wave luminosity of black hole mergers, very little is known about the electromagnetic luminosity that might occur in immediate conjunction with these events. We show that whenever the heat deposited in the gas near a pair of merging black holes is proportional to its total mass, and the surface density of the gas in the immediate vicinity is greater than the (quite small) amount necessary to make it optically thick, the characteristic scale of the luminosity emitted in direct association with the merger is the Eddington luminosity independent of the gas mass. The duration of the photon signal is proportional to the gas mass, and is generally rather longer than the merger event. At somewhat larger distances, dissipation associated with realigning the gas orbits to the new spin orientation of the black hole can supplement dissipation of the energy gained from orbital adjustment to the mass lost in gravitational radiation; these two heat sources can combine to augment the electromagnetic radiation over longer timescales.

[en] Substantial evidence points to dusty, geometrically thick tori obscuring the central engines of active galactic nuclei (AGNs), but so far no mechanism satisfactorily explains why cool dust in the torus remains in a puffy geometry. Near-Eddington infrared (IR) and ultraviolet (UV) luminosities coupled with high dust opacities at these frequencies suggest that radiation pressure on dust can play a significant role in shaping the torus. To explore the possible effects of radiation pressure, we perform three-dimensional radiative hydrodynamics simulations of an initially smooth torus. Our code solves the hydrodynamics equations, the time-dependent multi–angle group IR radiative transfer (RT) equation, and the time-independent UV RT equation. We find a highly dynamic situation. IR radiation is anisotropic, leaving primarily through the central hole. The torus inner surface exhibits a break in axisymmetry under the influence of radiation and differential rotation; clumping follows. In addition, UV radiation pressure on dust launches a strong wind along the inner surface; when scaled to realistic AGN parameters, this outflow travels at $\sim <!--\; ???\; -->5000{(M/{10}^7{M}_{\odot <!--\; ???\; -->})}^{1/4}$ ${[L_{\mathrm{U}\mathrm{V}}/(0.1L_{\mathrm{E}})]}^{1/4}\mathrm{k}\mathrm{m}{\mathrm{s}}^{-<!--\; ???\; -->1}$ and carries $\sim <!--\; ???\; -->0.1{(M/{10}^7{M}_{\odot <!--\; ???\; -->})}^{3/4}$ ${[L_{\mathrm{U}\mathrm{V}}/(0.1L_{\mathrm{E}})]}^{3/4}$ M _⊙ yr⁻¹, where M, $L_{\mathrm{U}\mathrm{V}}$, and $L_{\mathrm{E}}$ are the mass, UV luminosity, and Eddington luminosity of the central object respectively.

[en] On the basis of data from an energy-conserving three-dimensional general relativistic MHD simulation, we predict the statistical character of variability in the coronal luminosity from accreting black holes. When the inner boundary of the corona is defined to be the electron scattering photosphere, its location depends only on the mass accretion rate in Eddington units m-dot. Nearly independent of viewing angle and m-dot, the power spectrum over the range of frequencies from approximately the orbital frequency at the ISCO to ∼100 times lower is well approximated by a power law with index -2, crudely consistent with the observed power spectra of hard X-ray fluctuations in active galactic nuclei and the hard states of Galactic black hole binaries. The underlying physical driver for variability in the light curve is variations in the accretion rate caused by the chaotic character of MHD turbulence, but the power spectrum of the coronal light output is significantly steeper. Part of this contrast is due to the fact that the mass accretion rate can be significantly modulated by radial epicyclic motions that do not result in dissipation, and therefore do not drive luminosity fluctuations. The other part of this contrast is due to the inward decrease of the characteristic inflow time, which leads to decreasing radial coherence length with increasing fluctuation frequency.

[en] 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 photons with polarization oriented parallel to the disk surface. These seed photons are then inverse-Compton scattered through a hot (but thermal) corona, producing a hard X-ray power-law spectrum. We consider three different models for the corona geometry: a wedge 'sandwich' with aspect ratio H/R and vertically integrated optical depth τ₀ constant throughout the disk; an inhomogeneous 'clumpy' corona with a finite number of hot clouds distributed randomly above the disk within a wedge geometry; and a spherical corona of uniform density, centered on the BH and surrounded by a truncated thermal disk with inner radius R_edge. In all cases, we find a characteristic transition from horizontal polarization at low energies to vertical polarization above the thermal peak; the vertical direction is defined as the projection of the BH spin axis on the plane of the sky. We show how the details of the spectropolarization signal can be used to distinguish between these models and infer various properties of the corona and BH. Although the bulk of this paper focuses on stellar-mass BHs, we also consider the effects of coronal scattering on the X-ray polarization signal from supermassive BHs in active galactic nuclei.

[en] We present new calculations of X-ray polarization from black hole (BH) accretion disks in the thermally dominated state, using a Monte Carlo ray-tracing code in full general relativity. In contrast to many previously published studies, our approach allows us to include returning radiation that is deflected by the strong-field gravity of the BH and scatters off of the disk before reaching a distant observer. Although carrying a relatively small fraction of the total observed flux, the scattered radiation tends to be highly polarized and in a direction perpendicular to the direct radiation Agol and Krolik. For moderately large spin parameters (a/M ∼> 0.9), this scattered returning radiation dominates the polarization signal at energies above the thermal peak, giving a net rotation in the polarization angle of 90 deg. We show how these new features of the polarization spectra from BHs in the thermal state may be developed into a powerful tool for measuring BH spin and probing the gas flow in the innermost disk. In addition to determining the emission profile, polarization observations can be used to constrain other properties of the system such as BH mass, inclination, and distance. New instruments currently under development should be able to exploit this tool in the near future.

[en] Near-Eddington radiation from active galactic nuclei (AGNs) has significant dynamical influence on the surrounding dusty gas, plausibly furnishing AGNs with geometrically thick obscuration. We investigate this paradigm with radiative magnetohydrodynamics simulations. The simulations solve the magnetohydrodynamics equations simultaneously with the infrared (IR) and ultraviolet (UV) radiative transfer (RT) equations; no approximate closure is used for RT. We find that our torus, when given a suitable sub-Keplerian angular momentum profile, spontaneously evolves toward a state in which its opening angle, density distribution, and flow pattern change only slowly. This “steady” state lasts for as long as there is gas resupply toward the inner edge. The torus is best described as a midplane inflow and a high-latitude outflow. The outflow is launched from the torus inner edge by UV radiation and expands in solid angle as it ascends; IR radiation continues to drive the wide-angle outflow outside the central hole. The dusty outflow obscures the central source in soft X-rays, the IR, and the UV over three-quarters of solid angle, and each decade in column density covers roughly equal solid angle around the central source; these obscuration properties are similar to what observations imply.

[en] Using only physical mechanisms, i.e., 3D magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) with no phenomenological viscosity, we have simulated the dynamics of a moderately thin accretion disk subject to torques whose radial scaling mimics those produced by lowest-order post-Newtonian gravitomagnetism. In this simulation, we have shown how, in the presence of MHD turbulence, a time-steady transition can be achieved between an inner disk region aligned with the equatorial plane of the central mass’s spin and an outer region orbiting in a different plane. The position of the equilibrium orientation transition is determined by a balance between gravitomagnetic torque and warp-induced inward mixing of misaligned angular momentum from the outer disk. If the mixing is interpreted in terms of diffusive transport, the implied diffusion coefficient is ≃(0.6–0.8)$c_{\mathrm{s}}^2/\mathrm{\Omega <!--\; ??\; -->}$ for sound speed c_s and orbital frequency Ω. This calibration permits estimation of the orientation transition’s equilibrium location given the central mass, its spin parameter, and the disk’s surface density and scaleheight profiles. However, the alignment front overshoots before settling into an equilibrium, signaling that a diffusive model does not fully represent the time-dependent properties of alignment fronts under these conditions. Because the precessional torque on the disk at the alignment front is always comparable to the rate at which misaligned angular momentum is brought inward to the front by warp-driven radial motions, no break forms between the inner and outer portions of the disk in our simulation. Our results also raise questions about the applicability to MHD warped disks of the traditional distinction between “bending wave” and “diffusive” regimes.

[en] The black hole of an active galactic nucleus is encircled by an accretion disk. The surface density of the disk is always too low to affect the tidal disruption of a star, but it can be high enough that a vigorous interaction results when the debris stream returns to pericenter and punches through the disk. Shocks excited in the disk dissipate the kinetic energy of the disk interior to the impact point and expedite inflow toward the black hole. Radiatively efficient disks with luminosity $\gtrsim <!--\; ???\; -->{10}^{-<!--\; ???\; -->3}$ Eddington have a high enough surface density that the initial stream–disk interaction leads to energy dissipation at a super-Eddington rate. Because of the rapid inflow, only part of this dissipated energy emerges as radiation, while the rest is advected into the black hole. Dissipation, inflow, and cooling balance to keep the bolometric luminosity at an Eddington-level plateau whose duration is tens of days, with an almost linear dependence on stellar mass. After the plateau, the luminosity decreases in proportion to the disk surface density, with a power-law index between −3 and −2 at earlier times, and possibly a steeper index at later times.

[en] We consider the evolution of a supermassive black hole binary (SMBHB) surrounded by a retrograde accretion disk. Assuming the disk is exactly in the binary plane and transfers energy and angular momentum to the binary via direct gas accretion, we calculate the time evolution of the binaryʼs semimajor axis a and eccentricity e. Because the gas is predominantly transferred when the binary is at apocenter, we find the eccentricity grows rapidly while maintaining constant $a(1+e)$. After accreting only a fraction of the secondaryʼs mass, the eccentricity grows to nearly unity; from then on, gravitational wave (GW) emission dominates the evolution, preserving constant $a(1-<!--\; ???\; -->e)$. The high-eccentricity waveforms redistribute the peak GW power from the nHz to μHz bands, substantially affecting the signal that might be detected with pulsar timing arrays. We also estimate the torque coupling binaries of arbitrary eccentricity with obliquely aligned circumbinary disks. If the outer edge of the disk is not an extremely large multiple of the binary separation, retrograde accretion can drive the binary into the GW-dominated state before these torques align the binary with the angular momentum of the mass supply.

[en] Orbiting disks may exhibit bends due to a misalignment between the angular momentum of the inner and outer regions of the disk. We begin a systematic simulational inquiry into the physics of warped disks with the simplest case: the relaxation of an unforced warp under pure fluid dynamics, i.e., with no internal stresses other than Reynolds stress. We focus on the nonlinear regime in which the bend rate is large compared to the disk aspect ratio. When warps are nonlinear, strong radial pressure gradients drive transonic radial motions along the disk's top and bottom surfaces that efficiently mix angular momentum. The resulting nonlinear decay rate of the warp increases with the warp rate and the warp width, but, at least in the parameter regime studied here, is independent of the sound speed. The characteristic magnitude of the associated angular momentum fluxes likewise increases with both the local warp rate and the radial range over which the warp extends; it also increases with increasing sound speed, but more slowly than linearly. The angular momentum fluxes respond to the warp rate after a delay that scales with the square root of the time for sound waves to cross the radial extent of the warp. These behaviors are at variance with a number of the assumptions commonly used in analytic models to describe linear warp dynamics.