Constraining black hole spins with low-frequency quasi-periodic oscillations in soft states

Abstract

Black hole X-ray transients show a variety of state transitions during their outburst phases, characterized by changes in their spectral and timing properties. In particular, power density spectra (PDS) show quasi periodic oscillations (QPOs) that can be related to the accretion regime of the source. We looked for type-C QPOs in the disc-dominated state (i.e. the high soft state) and in the ultra-luminous state in the RXTE archival data of 12 transient black hole X-ray binaries known to show QPOs during their outbursts. We detected 6 significant QPOs in the soft state that can be classified as type-C QPOs. Under the assumption that the accretion disc in disc-dominated states extends down or close to the innermost stable circular orbit (ISCO) and that type-C QPOs would arise at the inner edge of the accretion flow, we use the relativistic precession model (RPM) to place constraints on the black hole spin. We were able to place lower limits on the spin value for all the 12 sources of our sample while we could place also an upper limit on the spin for 5 sources.

arXiv comment10 pages, 6 figures

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• Disc Tearing and Bardeen-Petterson Alignment in GRMHD Simulations of Highly Tilted Thin Accretion Discs
• A Remarkably Loud Quasi-Periodicity after a Star is Disrupted by a Massive Black Hole
• Reverberation in tidal disruption events: dust echoes, coronal emission lines, multi-wavelength cross-correlations, and QPOs
• On the different flavours of Lense-Thirring precession around accreting stellar mass black holes
• Physical origin of the nonphysical spin evolution of MAXI J1820+070
• Low Frequency Quasi Periodic Oscillations and Shocks in Accretion onto Black Hole
• Testing General Relativity using Quasi-Periodic Oscillations from X-ray Black Holes: XTE J1550-564 and GRO J1655-40
• Very low-frequency oscillations from the 11 Hz pulsar in Terzan 5: frame-dragging back on the table