Supermassive black holes through the lens of multiwavelength polarization
Affiliation: Turku University
Abstract: Supermassive black holes form the most intriguing astrophysical systems offering countless opportunities to study fundamental physics in regimes not accessible to laboratories on Earth. Their multimessenger emission manifests in the formation of accretion disks, jets, and the acceleration of extremely energetic particles all of which are still poorly understood. Multiwavelength polarization can provide answers to long standing black hole physics questions. However, until recently, the instruments and surveys necessary for such a task were missing. The recently launched Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer -- IXPE, the first X-ray polarization mission to target blazars, offers a radically new way of studying high-energy processes in relativistic jets. I will discuss the multiwavelength polarization observations and results from the first year of IXPE observations of radio galaxies and blazars.