The Event Horizon of M87

Abstract

The 6 billion solar mass supermassive black hole at the center of the giant elliptical galaxy M87 powers a relativistic jet. Observations at millimeter wavelengths with the Event Horizon Telescope have localized the emission from the base of this jet to angular scales comparable to the putative black hole horizon. The jet might be powered directly by an accretion disk or by electromagnetic extraction of the rotational energy of the black hole. However, even the latter mechanism requires a confining thick accretion disk to maintain the required magnetic flux near the black hole. Therefore, regardless of the jet mechanism, the observed jet power in M87 implies a certain minimum mass accretion rate. If the central compact object in M87 were not a black hole but had a surface, this accretion would result in considerable thermal near-infrared and optical emission from the surface. Current flux limits on the nucleus of M87 strongly constrain any such surface emission. This rules out the presence of a surface and thereby provides indirect evidence for an event horizon.

arXiv comment9 pages, 2 figures, submitted to ApJ

References in corpus (55)

• Coevolution (Or Not) of Supermassive Black Holes and Host Galaxies
• Hot Accretion Flows Around Black Holes
• Black Holes: Complementarity or Firewalls?
• Efficient Generation of Jets from Magnetically Arrested Accretion on a Rapidly Spinning Black Hole
• General Relativistic Magnetohydrodynamic Simulations of Magnetically Choked Accretion Flows around Black Holes
• Event-horizon-scale structure in the supermassive black hole candidate at the Galactic Centre
• Gravitational Vacuum Condensate Stars
• Magnetically Arrested Disk: An Energetically Efficient Accretion Flow
• The Feedback-Regulated Growth of Black Holes and Bulges through Gas Accretion and Starbursts in Cluster Central Dominant Galaxies
• Black Hole Spin and the Radio Loud/Quiet Dichotomy of Active Galactic Nuclei
• Three-dimensional MHD Simulations of Radiatively Inefficient Accretion Flows
• The relation between accretion rate and jet power in X-ray luminous elliptical galaxies
• GRMHD Simulations of Magnetized Advection Dominated Accretion on a Non-Spinning Black Hole: Role of Outflows
• The Black-Hole Mass in M87 from Gemini/NIFS Adaptive Optics Observations
• Advection-Dominated Accretion and the Black Hole Event Horizon
• Advection-Dominated Accretion Model of Sagittarius A*: Evidence for a Black Hole at the Galactic Center
• Jet Launching Structure Resolved Near the Supermassive Black Hole in M87
• M87 at 90cm: A Different Picture
• Filaments, Bubbles, and Weak Shocks in the Gaseous Atmosphere of M87
• The M87 Black Hole Mass from Gas-dynamical Models of Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph Observations
• Extracting energy from black holes: the relative importance of the Blandford-Znajek mechanism
• Reflections of AGN Outbursts in the Gaseous Atmosphere of M87
• Advection-Dominated Accretion and Black Hole Event Horizons
• Wormholes as Black Hole Foils
• The matter content of the jet in M87: evidence for an electron-positron jet
• New Evidence for Black Hole Event Horizons from Chandra
• 1.3 mm Wavelength VLBI of Sagittarius A*: Detection of Time-Variable Emission on Event Horizon Scales
• Accretion to Magnetized Stars through the Rayleigh-Taylor Instability: Global Three-Dimensional Simulations
• Energy, momentum and mass outflows and feedback from thick accretion discs around rotating black holes
• The Murmur of the Sleeping Black Hole: Detection of Nuclear Ultraviolet Variability in LINER Galaxies
• Dynamics and High Energy Emission of the Flaring HST-1 Knot in the M 87 Jet
• The Event Horizon of Sagittarius A*
• Observing the effects of the event horizon in black holes
• Chandra Imaging of the X-ray Core of the Virgo Cluster
• Innermost collimation structure of the M87 jet down to ~ten Schwarzschild radii
• Measuring Mass Accretion Rate onto the Supermassive Black Hole in M 87 Using Faraday Rotation Measure with the Submillimeter Array
• The Optical-Near-IR Spectrum of the M87 Jet From HST Observations
• On The Nature of the Compact Dark Mass at the Galactic Center
• M87 at metre wavelengths: the LOFAR picture
• The Parabolic Jet Structure in M87 as a Magnetohydrodynamic Nozzle
• Where are all the gravastars? Limits upon the gravastar model from accreting black holes
• Recollimation and Radiative Focusing of Relativistic Jets: Applications to Blazars and M87
• Interchange instability in an accretion disc with a poloidal magnetic field
• A Displaced Supermassive Black Hole in M87
• Quasi-Periodic Oscillations from Rayleigh-Taylor and Kelvin-Helmholtz Instability at a Disk-Magnetosphere Interface
• Optical Polarization and Spectral Variability in the M87 Jet
• The kinematic of HST-1 in the jet of M87
• Analysis of the Synchrotron Emission from the M87 Jet
• Optical Proper Motion Measurements of the M87 Jet: New Results from the Hubble Space Telescope
• The information paradox and the infall problem
• The nuclei of radio galaxies in the UV: the signature of different emission processes
• On the Lack of Type I X-ray Bursts in Black Hole X-ray Binaries: Evidence for the Event Horizon?
• The 1.6 micron near infrared nuclei of 3C radio galaxies: Jets, thermal emission or scattered light?
• Hubble Space Telescope observations of an extraordinary flare in the M87 jet
• Remnants, Fuzzballs or Wormholes?

Cited by in corpus (67)

• First M87 Event Horizon Telescope Results. I. The Shadow of the Supermassive Black Hole
• First M87 Event Horizon Telescope Results. VI. The Shadow and Mass of the Central Black Hole
• First M87 Event Horizon Telescope Results. V. Physical Origin of the Asymmetric Ring
• First Sagittarius A* Event Horizon Telescope Results. VI: Testing the Black Hole Metric
• Echoes from the Abyss: Tentative evidence for Planck-scale structure at black hole horizons
• First Sagittarius A* Event Horizon Telescope Results. IV. Variability, Morphology, and Black Hole Mass
• Shadows of spherically symmetric black holes and naked singularities
• Gravitational Condensate Stars: An Alternative to Black Holes
• Phenomenological aspects of black holes beyond general relativity
• Shadows of rotating wormholes
• Photon Regions and Shadows of Accelerated Black Holes
• The central parsecs of M87: jet emission and an elusive accretion disc
• Sgr A* and General Relativity
• The Milky Way's Supermassive Black Hole: How good a case is it? A Challenge for Astrophysics & Philosophy of Science
• Horizon-Scale Lepton Acceleration in Jets: Explaining the Compact Radio Emission in M87
• Shadow cast by rotating braneworld black holes with a cosmological constant
• Testing the No-Hair Theorem with Observations of Black Holes in the Electromagnetic Spectrum
• Modeling non-thermal emission from the jet-launching region of M 87 with adaptive mesh refinement
• Einstein-Æther Gravity in the light of Event Horizon Telescope Observations of M87*
• Faraday rotation in the jet of M87 inside the Bondi radius: indication of winds from hot accretion flows confining the relativistic jet
• Shadow images of Kerr-like wormholes
• Gravitational echoes from macroscopic quantum gravity effects
• Black Hole Echology: The Observer's Manual
• Magnetoluminescence
• Towards a Non-singular Paradigm of Black Hole Physics
• Shadow Images of a Rotating Dyonic Black Hole with a Global Monopole Surrounded by Perfect Fluid
• Influence of an anisotropic matter field on the shadow of a rotating black hole
• Images of magnetospheric reconnection-powered radiation around supermassive black holes
• Silhouettes of invisible black holes
• Discovery of a FR0 radio galaxy emitting at $\gamma$-ray energies
• Gravitational lensing by a Horndeski black hole
• Towards VLBI Observations of Black Hole Structure
• Stellar disruption events support the existence of the black hole event horizon
• Gravitational Vacuum Condensate Stars
• Horizonless spacetimes as seen by present and next-generation Event Horizon Telescope arrays
• Gravitational Lenses as High-Resolution Telescopes
• M87: a cosmic laboratory for deciphering black hole accretion and jet formation
• Gravitational Lensing of a star by a rotating black hole
• Resolving accretion flows in nearby active galactic nuclei with the Event Horizon Telescope
• Spherical Skyrmion black holes as gravitational lenses
• Effects of Scalar-Tensor-Vector Gravity on relativistic jets
• Can the Slow-Rotation Approximation be used in Electromagnetic Observations of Black Holes?
• Probing Intermediate Mass Black Holes in M87 through Multi-Wavelength Gravitational Wave Observations
• Shadow thermodynamics of non-linear charged Anti-de Sitter black holes
• Electromagnetic tests of horizonless rotating black hole mimickers
• Modeling the motion of a bright spot in jets from black holes M87* and SgrA*
• Acceleration of high energy protons in AGN relativistic jets
• Conceptual Analysis of Black Hole Entropy in String Theory
• Constraints on the black-hole charges of M87* and Sagittarius A* by changing rates of photon spheres can be relaxed
• Polarization Observations of AGN Jets: Past and Future
• Jet in jet in M87
• High energy particle collisions in static, spherically symmetric black-hole-like wormholes
• Reconciling EHT and Gas Dynamics Measurements in M87: Is the Jet Misaligned at Parsec Scales?
• Regular scale-dependent black holes as gravitational lenses
• Observational Signatures of Black Hole Accretion: Rotating vs. Spherical Flows with Tilted Magnetic Fields
• Centrifugal acceleration of protons by a supermassive black hole
• Echoes from beyond: Detecting gravitational-wave quantum imprints with LISA
• Gravitational lensing and shadow of charged black holes in the low-energy limit of string theory
• WISE2MBH: A scaling-based algorithm for probing supermassive black hole masses through WISE catalogues
• "Firewall" Phenomenology with Astrophysical Neutrinos
• Far-UV Emission Properties of FR1 Radio Galaxies
• Shadow of axisymmetric, stationary and asymptotically flat black holes in the presence of plasma
• Observational signatures of Rotating compact objects in Plasma space-time
• Bridging Bondi and Event Horizon Scales: 3D GRMHD Simulations Reveal X-Shaped Radio Galaxy Morphology
• Shadow cast by a rotating black hole with anisotropic matter
• Constraints on horizonless objects after the EHT observation of Sagittarius A*
• Decoding Horizonless Spacetime: Plasma-Induced Features in a Rotating Wormhole Shadow