Warping of accretion disk and launching of jet by a spinning black hole in NGC 4258

TL;DR

This study models the accretion disk and jet launching in NGC 4258, linking black hole spin, disk warping, and jet power through a coupled accretion-jet framework involving the Blandford-Znajek and Bardeen-Petterson effects.

Contribution

It presents a combined accretion-jet model that estimates black hole spin and disk warp radius in NGC 4258, integrating observational data with theoretical mechanisms.

Findings

Black hole in NGC 4258 has a spin parameter of about 0.7.

The warp radius driven by Bardeen-Petterson effect matches observations.

The model successfully explains the spectral energy distribution from radio to X-rays.

Abstract

We fit the most updated broadband spectral energy distribution from radio to X-rays for NGC 4258 with a coupled accretion-jet model that surrounding a Kerr black hole (BH), where both the jet and the warped H_2O maser disk are assumed to be triggered by a spinning BH through Blandford-Znajek mechanism and Bardeen-Petterson effect respectively. The accretion flow consists with an inner radiatively inefficient accretion flow (RIAF) and an outer truncated standard thin disk, where the transition radius R_tr~3*10^3Rg for NGC 4258 based on the width and variability of its narrow Fe K$\alpha$ line. The hybrid jet formation model, as a variant of Blandford-Znajek model, is used to model the jet power. Therefore, we can estimate the accretion rate and BH spin through the two observed quantities--X-ray emission and jet power, where the observed jet power is estimated from the low-frequency radio emission. Through this method, we find that the BH of NGC 4258 should be mildly spinning with dimensionless spin parameter a_*=0.7\pm0.2. The outer thin disk mainly radiates at near infrared waveband and the jet contributes predominantly at radio waveband. Using above estimated BH spin and the inferred accretion rate at the region of the maser disk based on the physical existence of the H_2 O maser, we find that the warp radius is ~8.6*10^4 R_g if it is driven by the Bardeen-Petterson effect, which is consistent with the observational result very well.