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R. K. Williams (University of Florida)
In this paper, I present a theoretical and numerical (Monte Carlo) N-particle\/ fully relativistic 4-D (spacetime) analysis of Penrose scattering processes (Compton and \gamma \gamma \longrightarrow e- e+\/) in the ergosphere of a supermassive Kerr (rotating) black hole. These general relativistic model calculations surprisingly reveal that the observed high energies and luminosities of quasars and other active galactic nuclei, the collimated jets about the polar axis, and the asymmetrical jets (which can be enhanced by relativistic Doppler beaming effects) all are inherent properties of rotating black holes. From this analysis, it is shown that the Penrose scattered escaping relativistic particles exhibit tightly wound coil-like cone distributions (highly collimated vortical jet distributions) about the polar axis, with helical polar angles of escape varying from 0.5o to 30o for the highest energy particles. It is also shown that the gravitomagnetic field, which causes the dragging of inertial frames, exerts a force acting on the momentum vectors of the incident and scattered particles, causing the particle emission to be asymmetrical above and below the equatorial plane, thus appearing to break the equatorial reflection symmetry of the Kerr metric. This energy-momentum extraction model can be applied to any size black hole, irrespective of the mass, and therefore applies to microquasars as well. Importantly, as relativistic Penrose produced e-e+ pairs escape along vortical polar trajectories, they can induce a dynamo-like magnetic field having features similar to that of a solenoid-type field: B\propto I n/c \,\hat e_z, where I is the current generated by the escaping electrons and n is the number of ``turns'' (i.e., trajectories) about the polar axis per unit length. This field could further aid in the collimation, as well as be responsible for the observed synchrotron radiation and measured polarization. The consistency of these model calculations with observations suggests that the external magnetic field of the accretion disk plays a negligible role in the extraction of energy-momentum from a rotating black hole, inside the ergosphere, close to the event horizon, where gravitational forces, and thus the dynamics of the black hole, appear to be dominant, as would be expected.
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Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 35#5
© 2003. The American Astronomical Soceity.