Magnetosphere of a spinning black hole and the role of the current sheet

Abstract

We revisit the problem of a spinning black hole immersed in a uniformly magnetized plasma within the context of force-free electrodynamics. Such configurations have been found to relax to stationary jetlike solutions that are powered by the rotational energy of the black hole. We write down an analytic description for the jet solutions in the low black hole spin limit, and demonstrate that it provides a good approximation to the configurations found dynamically. For characterizing the magnetospheres of rapidly spinning black holes, we find that the current sheet which forms in the black hole ergosphere plays an essential role. We study the properties of the current sheet, and its importance in determining the jet solution and the rate at which energy is extracted from the black hole.

10 pages, 8 figures; revised to match PRD version

References in corpus (7)

• "Meissner effect" and Blandford-Znajek mechanism in conductive black hole magnetospheres
• Black Hole Magnetospheres
• The role of the ergosphere in the Blandford-Znajek process
• Stability of Force-Free Magnetospheres
• Magnetosphere of a Kerr black hole immersed in magnetized plasma and its perturbative mode structure
• A novel scheme for simulating the force-free equations: boundary conditions and the evolution of solutions towards stationarity
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• Extracting energy via magnetic reconnection from Kerr-de Sitter black holes
• Initial data for general relativistic simulations of multiple electrically charged black holes with linear and angular momenta
• Energy Extraction via Magnetic Reconnection in Konoplya-Rezzolla-Zhidenko Parametrized Black Holes
• Energy extraction via magnetic reconnection in magnetized black holes
• Toward a Full MHD Jet Model of Spinning Black Holes--II: Kinematics and Application to the M87 Jet
• Energy extraction through magnetic reconnection from a Kerr-Newman black hole in perfect fluid dark matter
• Towards a Full MHD Jet Model of Spinning Black Holes--I: Framework and a split monopole example
• Magnetosphere structure of a Kerr black hole: marginally force-free equatorial boundary condition
• Generalized split monopole magnetospheres: the effects of current sheets
• Particle acceleration driven by null electromagnetic fields near a Kerr black hole
• Universality of the Blandford-Znajek emission in stationary and axisymmetric spacetimes