Identification of Shocks in the Spectra from Black Holes

Abstract

We study the spectral properties of a low angular momentum flow as a function of the shock strength, compression ratio, accretion rate and flow geometry. In the absence of a satisfactory description of magnetic fields inside the advective disk, we consider the presence of only stochastic fields and use the ratio of the field energy density to the gravitational energy density as a parameter. We not only include ‘conventional’ synchrotron emission and Comptonization by Maxwell-Boltzmann electrons in the gas, but we also compute these effects due to power-law electrons. For strong shocks, a bump is produced due to the post-shock flow. Power-law spectral components due to the thermal and non-thermal electrons appear after this bump.