Testing General Relativity with Supermassive Black Holes Using X-Ray Reflection Spectroscopy

Askar  B. Abdikamalov; Dimitry Ayzenberg; Cosimo Bambi; Sourabh Nampalliwar; Ashutosh Tripathi; Jelen Wong; Yerong Xu; Jinli Yan; Yunfeng Yan; Yuchan Yang

doi:10.3390/proceedings2019017002

Proceedings (Jun 2019)

Testing General Relativity with Supermassive Black Holes Using X-Ray Reflection Spectroscopy

Askar B. Abdikamalov,
Dimitry Ayzenberg,
Cosimo Bambi,
Sourabh Nampalliwar,
Ashutosh Tripathi,
Jelen Wong,
Yerong Xu,
Jinli Yan,
Yunfeng Yan,
Yuchan Yang

Affiliations

Askar B. Abdikamalov: Center for Field Theory and Particle Physics and Department of Physics, Fudan University, Shanghai 200438, China
Dimitry Ayzenberg: Center for Field Theory and Particle Physics and Department of Physics, Fudan University, Shanghai 200438, China
Cosimo Bambi: Center for Field Theory and Particle Physics and Department of Physics, Fudan University, Shanghai 200438, China
Sourabh Nampalliwar: Theoretical Astrophysics, Eberhard-Karls Universität Tübingen, 72076 Tübingen, Germany
Ashutosh Tripathi: Center for Field Theory and Particle Physics and Department of Physics, Fudan University, Shanghai 200438, China
Jelen Wong: Center for Field Theory and Particle Physics and Department of Physics, Fudan University, Shanghai 200438, China
Yerong Xu: Center for Field Theory and Particle Physics and Department of Physics, Fudan University, Shanghai 200438, China
Jinli Yan: Center for Field Theory and Particle Physics and Department of Physics, Fudan University, Shanghai 200438, China
Yunfeng Yan: Center for Field Theory and Particle Physics and Department of Physics, Fudan University, Shanghai 200438, China
Yuchan Yang: Center for Field Theory and Particle Physics and Department of Physics, Fudan University, Shanghai 200438, China

DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/proceedings2019017002
Journal volume & issue: Vol. 17, no. 1
p. 2

Abstract

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In this paper, we review our current efforts to test General Relativity in the strong field regime by studying the reflection spectrum of supermassive black holes. So far we have analyzed 11 sources with observations of NuSTAR, Suzaku, Swift, and XMM-Newton. Our results are consistent with General Relativity, according to which the spacetime metric around astrophysical black holes should be well approximated by the Kerr solution. We discuss the systematic uncertainties in our model and we present a preliminary study on the impact of some of them on the measurement of the spacetime metric.

Published in Proceedings

ISSN: 2504-3900 (Online)
Publisher: MDPI AG
Country of publisher: Switzerland
LCC subjects: General Works
Website: http://www.mdpi.com/journal/proceedings

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