Spitzer Observations of the Predicted Eddington Flare from Blazar OJ 287

Laine, Seppo; Dey, Lankeswar; Valtonen, M. J.; Gopakumar, A.; Zoła, S.; Komossa, S.; Kidger, M.; Pihajoki, Pauli; Gómez, J. L.; Caton, D. B.; Ciprini, S.; Dróżdż, M.; Gazeas, K.; Godunova, V.; Haque, Shirin; Hildebrandt, Felix; Hudec, R.; Jermak, Helen; Kong, Albert; Lehto, H. J.; Liakos, A.; Matsumoto, Katsura; Mugrauer, M.; Pursimo, T.; Reichart, D.; Simon, A.; Siwak, M.; Сонбас, Э.

doi:10.3847/2041-8213/ab79a4

Cited by 74 publications

(57 citation statements)

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“…This article emphasizes the importance of continuing monitoring of OJ 287 at all wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum as well as in gravitational waves. Even though the binary orbit has now been solved [33] and confirmed [34], there are many aspects of the system which still need verification and from which we can learn interesting astrophysics.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The 2005 flare came a week ahead of the orbital schedule calculated by Sundelius et al [44] and corrected for the astrophysical time shift between the disk impact and the flare by LV96 [47,48]. The latest prediction of the 2019 Eddington flare was successfully observed with the Spitzer space telescope [34] which showed that the orbital times are now known with the accuracy of ±4 h.…”

Section: Oj 287 and Its Bh Binary Central Engine Descriptionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Promise of Persistent Multi-Messenger Astronomy with the Blazar OJ 287

et al. 2021

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Successful observations of the seven predicted bremsstrahlung flares from the unique bright blazar OJ 287 firmly point to the presence of a nanohertz gravitational wave (GW) emitting supermassive black hole (SMBH) binary central engine. We present arguments for the continued monitoring of the source in several electromagnetic windows to firmly establish various details of the SMBH binary central engine description for OJ 287. In this article, we explore what more can be known about this system, particularly with regard to accretion and outflows from its two accretion disks. We mainly concentrate on the expected impact of the secondary black hole on the disk of the primary on 3 December 2021 and the resulting electromagnetic signals in the following years. We also predict the times of exceptional fades, and outline their usefulness in the study of the host galaxy. A spectral survey has been carried out, and spectral lines from the secondary were searched for but were not found. The jet of the secondary has been studied and proposals to discover it in future VLBI observations are mentioned. In conclusion, the binary black hole model explains a large number of observations of different kinds in OJ 287. Carefully timed future observations will be able to provide further details of its central engine. Such multi-wavelength and multidisciplinary efforts will be required to pursue multi-messenger nanohertz GW astronomy with OJ 287 in the coming decades.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Oj 287 and Its Bh Binary Central Engine Descriptionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Promise of Persistent Multi-Messenger Astronomy with the Blazar OJ 287

et al. 2021

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“…It has been demonstrated in the past that it is possible to measure spininduced multipole moments for intermediate mass-ratio [173,174] and extreme mass-ratio inspirals [175,176]. This parameter can also be constrained through electromagnetic observations of active galactic nuclei (see [177] for a recent measurement) and supermassive BHs [178].…”

Section: B Spin-induced Quadrupole Momentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tests of general relativity with binary black holes from the second LIGO-Virgo gravitational-wave transient catalog

Abbott¹,

Abbott²,

Abraham³

et al. 2021

Phys. Rev. D

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454

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Gravitational waves enable tests of general relativity in the highly dynamical and strong-field regime. Using events detected by LIGO-Virgo up to 1 October 2019, we evaluate the consistency of the data with predictions from the theory. We first establish that residuals from the best-fit waveform are consistent with detector noise, and that the low-and high-frequency parts of the signals are in agreement. We then consider parametrized modifications to the waveform by varying post-Newtonian and phenomenological coefficients, improving past constraints by factors of ∼2; we also find consistency with Kerr black holes when we specifically target signatures of the spin-induced quadrupole moment. Looking for gravitational-wave dispersion, we tighten constraints on Lorentz-violating coefficients by a factor of ∼2.6 and bound the mass of the graviton to m g ≤ 1.76 × 10 −23 eV=c 2 with 90% credibility. We also analyze the properties of the merger remnants by measuring ringdown frequencies and damping times, constraining fractional deviations away from the Kerr frequency to δf 220 ¼ 0.03 þ0.38 −0.35 for the fundamental quadrupolar mode, and δf 221 ¼ 0.04 þ0.27 −0.32 for the first overtone; additionally, we find no evidence for postmerger echoes. Finally, we determine that our data are consistent with tensorial polarizations through a template-independent method. When possible, we assess the validity of general relativity based on collections of events analyzed jointly. We find no evidence for new physics beyond general relativity, for black hole mimickers, or for any unaccounted systematics.

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“…The 2015-2016 The shaded regions mark the spectrally distinct high MW activity periods while the non-shaded parts trace the spectral transition and its evolution. The blue vertical dashed lines are the claimed time of the impact flares (Valtonen et al, 2016;Laine et al, 2020) while the black vertical dashed lines represent long-exposure observations by the AstroSat (Singh et al, 2021;Kushwaha et al, 2021).…”

Section: Oj 287mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The observational features that have made OJ 287 unique and untypical blazar are the claim of a persistent quasi-periodic ∼ 12-yr signal in optical bands (Sillanpaa et al, 1988;Dey et al, 2018;Laine et al, 2020), a yearly quasi-periodic variations in the location of quasistationary knots seen in radio images (Britzen et al, 2018) as well as claims of ∼ 22-yr (Britzen et al, 2018) and ∼ 30-yr periods (Cohen, 2017), and many transient spectral features like a sharp break in the NIR-optical spectrum (Kushwaha et al, 2018a, an extremely soft X-ray spectra dominated spectral state (Komossa et al, 2017(Komossa et al, , 2020 with a broadband spectrum similar to presence of an additional HBL-like emission component (Kushwaha et al, 2018b and peculiar timing trends untypical of blazars (Kushwaha et al, 2018b;Komossa et al, 2020;Huang et al, 2021), a Seyfert-like soft X-ray excess state , an iron line absorption feature (Komossa et al, 2020), an spectral cutoff in the high-energy end of the optical synchrotron spectrum (Singh et al, 2021;Kushwaha et al, 2021), etc. Regarding the ∼ 12-yr QPOOs, it should be noted that studies employing diverse and state-of-art timing methodologies (Peñil et al, 2020;Goyal et al, 2018) dispute the ∼ 12-yr recurrent optical outbursts.…”

Section: Oj 287mentioning

confidence: 99%

The BL Lac Object OJ 287: Exploring a Complete Spectrum of Issues Concerning Relativistic Jets and Accretion

Kushwaha¹

2021

Preprint

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The BL Lacertae object OJ 287 is one of the most dynamic blazars across the directly accessible observational windows -spectral, timing, polarization, and imaging. In addition to behaviors considered characteristics of blazars, it exhibits peculiar timing features like quasi periodicity in optical flux, radio-detected knots position, and has shown diverse transient spectral features like a spectral phase dominated by a new broadband emission component, Seyfert-like soft-X-ray excess, iron line absorption, a thermal-like emission dominated optical phase, large polarization swings associated with one of the timing features, etc. that are rare in blazars and contrary to currently prevailing view of BL Lacs. Theoretical considerations, supported by existing observations, invoke scenarios involving a dynamical interplay of accretion and/or strong-gravity-induced events (tidal forces) in a binary supermassive black hole (SMBH) scenario to impact-induced jet and only jet activities. A few of these models even make some definite and quite distinctive observationally testable predictions. These considerations make OJ 287 the only blazar/jetted-AGN to have an activity phase with dominance related to accretion and/or accretion-perturbation-induced jet activities. We present a brief overview of the unique spectral features and discuss the implications of these features in exploring not only relativistic jet physics but issues from accretion to accretion-regulated jet activities i.e. the whole spectrum of issues related to the jet-accretion paradigm in jetted SMBH systems that have not been possible so far due to jet emission shadowing other likely emission features/components.

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Spitzer Observations of the Predicted Eddington Flare from Blazar OJ 287

Cited by 74 publications

References 27 publications

Promise of Persistent Multi-Messenger Astronomy with the Blazar OJ 287

Promise of Persistent Multi-Messenger Astronomy with the Blazar OJ 287

Tests of general relativity with binary black holes from the second LIGO-Virgo gravitational-wave transient catalog

The BL Lac Object OJ 287: Exploring a Complete Spectrum of Issues Concerning Relativistic Jets and Accretion

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