Accretion onto the supermassive black hole at the centre of our galaxy

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapter

Abstract

Towards the end of his life, Ken Hines became fascinated with the physics of accretion onto the black hole at the centre of our Galaxy, a problem well suited to his extensive knowledge of magnetised, high-temperature plasmas. We spent several years formulating a strategy for analyzing the behaviour of ionised gas falling towards Sagittarius A*-as this object is known-but never quite finished the calculations. In this chapter, we will briefly review the circumstances that have made it possible for us to address this problem now, and demonstrate why Ken and I became so excited at the prospect of using the physics of accretion onto Sagittarius A* to probe the spacetime within a mere 20 Schwarzschild radii of its event horizon.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Title of host publicationIn Celebration of K C Hines
PublisherWorld Scientific Publishing Co.
Pages209-229
Number of pages21
ISBN (Electronic)9789814293662
ISBN (Print)9814293652, 9789814293655
DOIs
StatePublished - Jan 1 2009

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Physics and Astronomy(all)

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