Accretion in Active Galactic Nuclei

Abstract

We review the current status of the understanding how the accretion onto the central black hole proceeds in Active Galaxies. Standard accretion disk is a key element in all relatively bright active galaxies like Seyferts and quasars, although it is not present in very low luminosity sources, like Sgr A*. However, the standard disk does not explain the broad band spectrum, so the disk has to be supplemented with a number of additional components, and our deeper understanding of these components is still far from being complete. These additional elements are: compact hard X-ray corona, inner hot flow, warm corona, disk wind and the Broad Line Region, and finally dusty/molecular torus. All these elements seem to be needed in various proportions, depending predominantly on the Eddington ratio of a given source. These elements also interact with each other which is not yet fully taken into account.