Spins of the supermassive black hole in M87: new constraints from TeV observations

Abstract

The rapid TeV $\gamma -$ray variability detected in the well-known nearby radio galaxy M87 implies an extremely compact emission region (5-10 Schwarzschild radii) near the horizon of the supermassive black hole in the galactic center. TeV photons are affected by dilution due to interaction with the radiation field of the advection-dominated accretion flow (ADAF) around the black hole, and can thus be used to probe the innermost regions around the black hole. We calculate the optical depth of the ADAF radiation field to the TeV photons and find it strongly depends on the spin of the black hole. We find that transparent radii of 10 TeV photons are of $5R_{\mathrm{S}}$ and $13R_{\mathrm{S}}$ for the maximally rotating and non-rotating black holes, respectively. With the observations, the calculated transparent radii strongly suggest the black hole is spinning fast in the galaxy. TeV photons could be used as a powerful diagnostic for estimating black hole spins in galaxies in the future.

4 pages, 4 figures. to appear in ApJL

References in corpus (6)

• Constraining Black Hole Spin Via X-ray Spectroscopy
• Fast variability of TeV gamma-rays from the radio galaxy M 87
• Fuelling Active Galactic Nuclei
• Models for jet power in elliptical galaxies: A case for rapidly spinning black holes
• Evidence for Rapidly Spinning Black Holes in Quasars
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Cited by in corpus (6)

• Effects of AGN feedback on LCDM galaxies
• Constraint on the black-hole spin of M87 from the accretion-jet model
• An accretion-jet model for M87: interpreting the spectral energy distribution and Faraday rotation measure
• Probing the central black hole in M87 with gamma-rays
• The Lense-Thirring effect at work in M87${}^{\ast }$
• The no-hair theorems at work in M87${}^{\ast }$