Field: Astrophysics
Host: University of Hertfordshire
Funder: Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC)
Fellowship Title: Investigating the Mechanisms Behind Accretion State Transitions in Black Hole X-ray Binaries
Black holes are regions of space where gravity is so strong that nothing, not even light, can escape. Yanting’s research has focused on measuring the spin of black holes— one of the two fundamental parameters used to describe black holes in an astrophysical context — and exploring the properties of the material flowing towards them, known as accretion flows. She found evidence that changes in the state of a black hole system may be linked to changes in its corona, a region of extremely hot plasma surrounding the black hole.
After a more than 3-year career break, Yanting returned to research as a Daphne Jackson Fellow, funded by the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC). Her current research aims to investigate what drives changes in the behaviour of accretion flows around black holes. Specifically, her current work builds on her previous research and will eventually be extended to other black holes systems. By studying a larger sample, she aims to investigate whether the connection between state transitions and changes in the corona is a general property of black holes, as well as whether other physical processes may also play a role in driving these transitions. This will help understand how these black holes grow, how they were formed in the first place, and how they impact their surroundings.
