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Relativistic blue‐ and red‐shifted absorption lines in AGNs
Author(s) -
Cappi M.
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
astronomische nachrichten
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.394
H-Index - 63
eISSN - 1521-3994
pISSN - 0004-6337
DOI - 10.1002/asna.200610639
Subject(s) - physics , astrophysics , ionization , absorption (acoustics) , accretion (finance) , astrophysical jet , black hole (networking) , accretion disc , gravitation , absorption spectroscopy , spectroscopy , line (geometry) , active galactic nucleus , astronomy , spectral line , relativistic quantum chemistry , ion , atomic physics , optics , galaxy , computer network , routing protocol , routing (electronic design automation) , geometry , mathematics , quantum mechanics , computer science , link state routing protocol
Current, accumulating evidence for (mildly) relativistic blue‐ and red‐shifted absorption lines in AGNs is reviewed. XMM‐Newton and Chandra sensitive X‐ray observations are starting to probe not only the kinematics (velocity) but also the dynamics (accelerations) of highly ionized gas flowing in‐and‐out from, likely, a few gravitational radii from the black hole. It is thus emphasized that X‐ray absorption‐line spectroscopy provides new potential to map the accretion flows near black holes, to probe the launching regions of relativistic jets/outflows, and to quantify the cosmological feedback of AGNs. Prospects to tackle these issues with future high energy missions are briefly addressed. (© 2006 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)