Approaching the horizon for understanding black hole astrophysics and feedback
by
Sera Markoff(Anton Pannekoek Institute for Astronomy/GRAPPA, University of Amsterdam)
→
America/New_York
Description
FLATIRON INSTITUTE SEMINAR SERIES
Speaker: Sera Markoff, Professor of Theoretical High Energy Astrophysics, Anton Pannekoek Institute for Astronomy/GRAPPA, University of Amsterdam
Location: The seminar will be a hybrid event--attendees can either join in-person in the Flatiron Institute IDA or via Zoom (please see email invitation for link)
Date: Friday, December 3rd, 3-4 pm
Reception: To be held from 4 pm - 6 pm at 162 Fifth Ave. (location TBD)
Abstract:
Black holes are far from passive players in the Universe and in fact, when accreting, manage to efficiently convert energy from captured matter into other forms that can significantly affect their environments. The most dramatic example of this phenomenon are the relativistic jets launched near the event horizon, that somehow manage to extend to scales billions of times larger, and seem to win out over gravity when it comes to truncating massive galaxy formation. Along the way they are also potentially accelerating the highest energy particles detected on earth (ultrahigh energy cosmic rays). But even small black hole jets in the Galaxy may accelerate cosmic rays, and be important for local feedback on their surrounding gas. Understanding and modelling all of these aspects in a self-consistent way that has predictive power has been a longstanding challenge, with so many different scales and moving parts. After a broad review about our current basic understanding, I will present a few examples of how several key questions regarding black hole jets are starting to 'gel' into a more first-principles picture. As part of this story I will highlight the role of the Event Horizon Telescope together with multi-messenger facilities, both today and for potential future project extensions.
