Reflection features in the X-ray spectrum of Fairall 9 and implications for tests of general relativity

Abstract

X-ray reflection spectroscopy is potentially a powerful tool to probe the spacetime geometry around astrophysical black holes and test general relativity in the strong field regime. However, precision tests of general relativity are only possible if we employ the correct astrophysical model and we can limit the systematic uncertainties. It is thus crucial to select the sources and the observations most suitable for these tests. In this work, we analyze simultaneous observations of XMM-Newton and NuSTAR of the supermassive black hole in Fairall 9. This source has a number of properties that make it a promising candidate for tests of general relativity using X-ray reflection spectroscopy. Nevertheless, we find that with the available data there is not a unique interpretation of the spectrum of Fairall 9, which prevents, for the moment, to use this source for robust tests of general relativity. This issue may be solved by future X-ray missions with a higher energy resolution near the iron line.

10 pages, 7 figures

References in corpus (14)

• The Confrontation between General Relativity and Experiment
• Constraining Black Hole Spin Via X-ray Spectroscopy
• Simultaneous X-ray/optical/UV snapshots of active galactic nuclei from XMM-Newton: spectral energy distributions for the reverberation mapped sample
• Dynamical Chern-Simons Modified Gravity I: Spinning Black Holes in the Slow-Rotation Approximation
• CAIXA: a Catalogue of AGN In the XMM-Newton Archive I. Spectral analysis
• Slowly-Rotating Black Holes in Einstein-Dilaton-Gauss-Bonnet Gravity: Quadratic Order in Spin Solutions
• Evidence for Rapidly Spinning Black Holes in Quasars
• Public Release of RELXILL_NK: A Relativistic Reflection Model for Testing Einstein's Gravity
• Constraints on the spacetime metric around seven "bare" AGNs using X-ray reflection spectroscopy
• Note on the effect of a massive accretion disk in the measurements of black hole spins
• Correlated X-ray/UV/optical variability and the nature of accretion disc in the bare Seyfert 1 galaxy Fairall~9
• Testing the Kerr hypothesis using X-ray reflection spectroscopy with NuSTAR data of Cygnus X-1 in the soft state
• About the Kerr nature of the stellar-mass black hole in GRS 1915+105
• No Signatures of Black-Hole Spin in the X-ray Spectrum of the Seyfert 1 Galaxy Fairall 9

Cited by in corpus (3)

• Testing Gravity with Black Hole X-Ray Data
• A UV to X-ray view of soft excess in type 1 AGNs: I. sample selection and spectral profile
• The Origin of The Soft X-Ray Excess in the Seyfert 1.5 Galaxy ESO 362-G18