Observing gravitational lensing effects by Sgr A* with GRAVITY

TL;DR

This paper explores the potential of the upcoming GRAVITY instrument to observe gravitational lensing effects caused by Sgr A* on nearby stars, including astrometric shifts and relativistic effects.

Contribution

It assesses the observability of gravitational lensing phenomena near Sgr A* with GRAVITY, highlighting the detection of star S17's displacement and potential relativistic effects.

Findings

Astrometric displacement of S17 can be detected with GRAVITY.

Gravitational lensing effects are observable for certain star configurations.

Relativistic effects like black hole spin influence lensing signals.

Abstract

The massive black hole at the Galactic center Sgr A* is surrounded by a cluster of stars orbiting around it. Light from these stars is bent by the gravitational field of the black hole, giving rise to several phenomena: astrometric displacement of the primary image, the creation of a secondary image that may shift the centroid of Sgr A*, magnification effects on both images. The near-to-come second generation VLTI instrument GRAVITY will perform observations in the Near Infrared of the Galactic Center at unprecedented resolution, opening the possibility of observing such effects. Here we investigate the observability limits for GRAVITY of gravitational lensing effects on the S-stars in the parameter space [DLS,gamma,K], where DLS is the distance between the lens and the source, gamma is the alignment angle of the source, and K is the source apparent magnitude in the K-band. The easiest effect to be observed in the next years is the astrometric displacement of primary images. In particular the shift of the star S17 from its Keplerian orbit will be detected as soon as GRAVITY becomes operative. For exceptional configurations it will be possible to detect effects related to the spin of the black hole or Post-Newtonian orders in the deflection.