Strong and Weak Deflection of Light in the Equatorial Plane of a Kerr Black Hole

Abstract

Analytical series expansions for the bending of light in the equatorial plane of a Kerr black hole are presented in both the strong and weak deflection regimes. It is critical that these are known in analytical form so further analysis can be done for predicting different properties of images formed in gravitational lensing. Starting with the exact bending angle in terms of the spin parameter, we apply a perturbative scheme for rewriting the bending angle as series expansions in terms of the impact parameter of the incident light ray. The asymmetry introduced by the black hole spin results in spin-dependent shifts in image positions. We apply our results for the case of a galactic supermassive black hole to predict angular shifts of relativistic images from the optic axis. This would not be possible without the perturbative expansions in the strong deflection regime, only in which relativistic images have a chance of being resolved by future telescopes.

arXiv comment16 figures

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