paper

Fifty years of energy extraction from rotating black hole: revisiting magnetic Penrose process

arXiv:1905.05321 · doi:10.3390/universe5050125

Abstract

Magnetic Penrose process (MPP) is not only the most exciting and fascinating process mining the rotational energy of black hole but it is also the favored astrophysically viable mechanism for high energy sources and phenomena. It operates in three regimes of efficiency, namely low, moderate and ultra, depending on the magnetization and charging of spinning black holes in astrophysical setting. In this paper, we revisit MPP with a comprehensive discussion of its physics in different regimes, and compare its operation with other competing mechanisms. We show that MPP could in principle foot the bill for powering engine of such phenomena as ultra-high-energy cosmic rays, relativistic jets, fast radio bursts, quasars, AGNs, etc. Further, it also leads to a number of important observable predictions. All this beautifully bears out the promise of a new vista of energy powerhouse heralded by Roger Penrose half a century ago through this process, and it has today risen in its magnetically empowered version of mid 1980s from a purely thought experiment of academic interest to a realistic powering mechanism for various high-energy astrophysical phenomena.

25 pages, 3 figures, 2 tables; published version, some references added; Invited Review for the special issue on Accretion Disks, Jets, GRBs and related Gravitational Waves; This work is dedicated to the fond memory of Dr. Sanjay Wagh, who was one of the initiators of work on magnetic Penrose process in his doctoral thesis in mid 1980s. He passed away on the day this paper appeared on arXiv

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