Observing the strong gravity regime of accreting black holes with Simbol-X

TL;DR

This paper explores how well the Simbol-X mission can observe X-ray reflection features from accretion disks around black holes, providing insights into strong gravity effects near black holes.

Contribution

It presents detailed simulations of X-ray reflection spectra including relativistic effects to assess Simbol-X's capability in probing black hole gravity regimes.

Findings

Simbol-X can detect iron K-line and Compton hump features with high precision.

Relativistic effects significantly influence the observed spectra.

Black hole parameters and disk irradiation patterns affect spectral signatures.

Abstract

The X-ray reflection features of irradiated accretion disks around black holes enable us to probe the effects of strong gravity. We investigate to which precision the reflection signs, i.e. the iron K-line and the Comptonized hump, can be observed with Simbol-X for nearby Seyfert galaxies. The simulations presented include accurate computations of the local reprocessed spectra and modifications due to general relativistic effects in the vicinity of the black hole. We discuss the impact of global black hole parameters and of the irradiation pattern of the disk on the resulting spectra as they will be detected by the Simbol-X mission.