[Previous] | [Session 23] | [Next]
D. Psaltis (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics)
Weakly magnetic accreting neutron stars and black holes show strong quasi-periodic variability over timescales that span a very wide range. These properties offer us a unique opportunity to improve our understanding of basic physical processes in strong gravitational fields as they reveal, for the first time, phenomena that occur on the most fundamental time scales near accreting compact objects. I will discuss recent progress in the theoretical modeling of the characteristic variability frequencies of accretion flows. I will emphasize the general-relativistic and hydrodynamic effects on the expected variability frequencies and show that such effects have already been observed in a variety of galactic accreting sources.