Warp and eccentricity propagation in discs around black holes

Abstract

We consider the inward propagation of warping and eccentric disturbances in discs around black holes under a wide variety of conditions. In our calculations we use secular theories of warped and eccentric discs and assume the deformations to be stationary and propagating in a disc model similar to regions (a) and (b) of Shakura and Sunyaev discs. We find that the propagation of deformations to the innermost regions of the disc is facilitated for low viscous damping and high accretion rate. We relate our results to the possible excitation of trapped inertial modes, and to the observations of high-frequency quasi-periodic oscillations (QPOs) in black hole systems in the very high spectral state.