Overview
- Nominated as an outstanding thesis by the University of Southampton
- Provides a comprehensive overview of spectral variability in black holes
- Introduces a new technique for examining short time-scale spectral variability in X-ray binaries
- Contains a catalog of Chandra images and spectra of nearby galactic nuclei
- Includes supplementary material: sn.pub/extras
Part of the book series: Springer Theses (Springer Theses)
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About this book
This thesis brings together the various techniques of X-ray spectral analysis in order to examine the properties of black holes that vary in mass by several orders of magnitude. In all these systems it is widely accepted that the X-ray emission is produced by Compton up-scattering of lower energy seed photons in a hot corona or accretion flow, and here these processes are examined through a study of the X-ray spectral variability of each source. A new technique is introduced, in which models are fitted to over 2 million X-ray spectra on time-scales as short as 16 ms, and subsequently it is shown that the nature of the correlation between intensity and spectral index is strongly dependent upon the spectral state of the black hole. Finally, the results of an extensive survey of nearby galactic nuclei using the Chandra X-ray telescope are presented in the form of images and spectra, and these results are used along with data from the literature to search for Compton-thick nuclei.
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Table of contents (5 chapters)
Authors and Affiliations
About the author
Dr. Chris J. Skipper got his MSc from University of Southampton with First Class Honors and was awarded his PhD from Southampton in 2013, where he is now working as a SKA Research Fellow.
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Bibliographic Information
Book Title: Fast Spectral Variability in the X-ray Emission of Accreting Black Holes
Authors: Chris Skipper
Series Title: Springer Theses
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-09587-5
Publisher: Springer Cham
eBook Packages: Physics and Astronomy, Physics and Astronomy (R0)
Copyright Information: Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2015
Hardcover ISBN: 978-3-319-09586-8Published: 17 September 2014
Softcover ISBN: 978-3-319-36436-0Published: 22 September 2016
eBook ISBN: 978-3-319-09587-5Published: 04 September 2014
Series ISSN: 2190-5053
Series E-ISSN: 2190-5061
Edition Number: 1
Number of Pages: XXXIII, 150
Number of Illustrations: 15 b/w illustrations, 64 illustrations in colour