Universal Behavior of X-ray Flares from Black Hole Systems

TL;DR

This paper shows that X-ray flares from black hole systems across a vast range of masses share statistical properties with solar flares, indicating a common magnetic reconnection origin and potentially magnetically dominated jets.

Contribution

It demonstrates that X-ray flares from diverse black hole systems exhibit universal statistical behaviors similar to solar flares, suggesting a shared physical mechanism.

Findings

X-ray flares follow power-law distributions in energy, duration, and waiting times.

Statistical properties are explained by a fractal-diffusive self-organized criticality model.

Flares are likely triggered by magnetic reconnection, indicating magnetically dominated jets.

Abstract

X-ray flares have been discovered in black hole systems, such as gamma-ray bursts, the tidal disruption event Swift J1644+57, the supermassive black hole Sagittarius A$^*$ at the center of our Galaxy, and some active galactic nuclei. Their occurrences are always companied by relativistic jets. However, it is still unknown whether there is a physical analogy among such X-ray flares produced in black hole systems spanning nine orders of magnitude in mass. Here we report the observed data of X-ray flares, and show that they have three statistical properties similar to solar flares, including power-law distributions of energies, durations, and waiting times, which both can be explained by a fractal-diffusive self-organized criticality model. These statistical similarities, together with the fact that solar flares are triggered by a magnetic reconnection process, suggest that all of the X-ray flares are consistent with magnetic reconnection events, implying that their concomitant relativistic jets may be magnetically dominated.