Towards constraining the central black hole's properties by studying its infrared flares with the GRAVITY instrument

TL;DR

This paper explores how the GRAVITY instrument can use infrared flares from the Galactic center to better understand the black hole's properties, especially its inclination, through detailed relativistic modeling.

Contribution

It demonstrates that the GRAVITY instrument can potentially constrain the black hole's inclination by analyzing infrared flares within the hot spot model using relativistic simulations.

Findings

GRAVITY can constrain the black hole's inclination.

Relativistic modeling of infrared flares is effective.

Infrared flares serve as probes of strong gravity.

Abstract

The ability of the near future second generation VLTI instrument GRAVITY to constrain the properties of the Galactic center black hole is investigated. The Galactic center infrared flares are used as probes of strong-field gravity, within the framework of the hot spot model according to which the flares are the signature of a blob of gas orbiting close to the black hole's innermost stable circular orbit. Full general relativistic computations are performed, together with realistic observed data simulations, that lead to conclude that GRAVITY could be able to constrain the black hole's inclination parameter.