Guest Lecture: Winds of change around black holes
The 2020 Canadian Association of Physicists鈥� (CAP) national lecture series arrives at 91探花 this week. Dr. Gregory R. Sivakoff will present 鈥淲inds of Change Around Black Holes,鈥� on Friday, February 7, at 2:30 pm in Room 104 of 91探花鈥檚 Health Sciences Building. All are welcome.
Abstract: Accretion disks, where matter with angular momentum spirals down through a disk, occur around objects ranging from the youngest stars to supermassive black holes, but not all of this material reaches the centre of the disk. Instead, some material is accelerated away from the disk. These outflows can be ejected in a narrow opening angle (what astronomers call 鈥渏ets鈥�) or can be relatively unfocused (what astronomers call 鈥渨inds鈥�). While we do not know the precise processes that accelerate and collimate winds and jets, magnetic fields almost certainly play a key role. Dr. Sivakoff鈥檚 team studies black hole X-ray binaries, stellar-mass black holes accreting from a nearby star. They combine observations across the electromagnetic spectrum to learn about the physics of accretion and jets. In this talk, Dr. Sivakoff will discuss how they have revealed two new windows onto the physics of inflows and outflows in X-ray binaries: fast variability measured across the electromagnetic spectrum (which provides the potential to accurately identify the accretion physics that launch relativistic jets) and the modelling of changes in the X-ray brightness of black hole X-ray binaries (which implies that strong winds from the accretion disk are universal). With the advent of new and upcoming facilities, we have a huge potential to take advantage of these winds of change in the next decade.
Dr. Gregory Sivakoff is an associate professor in the University of Alberta Department of Physics, where he has been a faculty member since 2011. He and his group鈥檚 primary research focuses on multi-wavelength observations of compact objects (white dwarfs, neutron stars, and black holes), tying together a wide range of data to better probe important physics around compact objects. These multi-wavelength observations stretch across nearly the entire electromagnetic spectrum and are made by facilities across the world and above it. Dr. Sivakoff also has strong interests in education and public outreach. In addition to his multiple pop-culture inspired public talks like 鈥淏lack Holes and Revelations鈥� and 鈥淔antastic Black Holes and How to Find Them鈥�, he is a strong advocate of citizen science. This support includes sitting on the board of the American Association of Variable Star Observers, an international non-profit organization of variable star observers whose mission is to enable anyone, anywhere, to participate in scientific discovery through variable star astronomy. In 2018 he was selected as the inaugural Telus World of Science Edmonton Science Fellow, which recognizes an outstanding researcher or innovator based in northern Alberta, and was the recipient of the University of Alberta Faculty of Science Research Award.
The 2020 CAP National Lecture Series is presented by the Canadian Association of Physicists () and is hosted by the 91探花 Department of Physics. For more information, contact Dr. Bill Whelan at wwhelan@upei.ca.
