Testing the Schwarzschild metric in a strong field region with the Event Horizon Telescope

Abstract

Testing gravity theory in the strong field region becomes a reality due to the observations of gravitational waves and black hole shadows. In this paper, we discuss how to constrain the possible deviations of the classical general relativity with the image of M87* observed by the Event Horizon Telescope. More precisely, we want to know where is the event horizon for a non-rotating black hole. General relativity predicts the horizon is located at the Schwarzschild radius rs, while other gravity theories may give different predictions. We propose a parameterized Schwarzschild metric (PSM) in which the horizon is located at r = nrs, where n is a real free parameter, and prove general relativity with nonlinear electrodynamics allows n = 1. In the weak field region, the PSM is equivalent to the Schwarzschild metric regardless of the value of n. In the strong field region, the difference between the PSM and Schwarzschild metric would leave an imprint on the shadow image. We present detailed calculations and discussions on the black hole shadows with large background light source and accretion disk in the PSM framework. More importantly, we point out that n ≈ 2 can be used to explain why the black hole mass measured by the shadow is a factor of about two larger than the previous gas dynamics measurements. If this explanation is confirmed to be right, then this phenomenon, together with the late-time cosmological acceleration, will be very important to test gravity theories.

Quasinormal modes, stability and shadows of a black hole in the 4D Einstein–Gauss–Bonnet gravity

“…Theoretical analysis of shapes of the black hole shadows have been recently considered in a great number of papers (see, for example, [76][77][78][79][80][81][82][83] and references therein). The radius of the photon sphere r ph of a spherically symmetric black hole is determined by means of the following function: (see, for example, [84,85] and references therein)…”

Observational signatures of wormholes with thin accretion disks

“…In this paper, we point out that one can observe dramatic differences between these objects in the context of their accretion disk images (see [46][47][48][49][50][51] for some works on images of accretion disks around different objects). We proceed with two assumptions here.…”

Can we distinguish black holes from naked singularities by the images of their accretion disks?

“…Thin accretion disk and their various aspects in JMN-2 [31], Reissner-Nordstrom [54,55], rotating JNW [56], Kerr-Taub-NUT [57] and Kerr naked singularity [58,59] has also been considered. See [60][61][62][63] for some works on images of black holes with thin accretion disks.…”