It has long been speculated that the nature of the hard X-ray corona may be an important second driver of black hole state transitions , in addition to the mass accretion rate through the disk .
However , a clear physical picture of coronal changes has not yet emerged .
We present results from a systematic analysis of Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer observations of the stellar mass black hole binary XTE J1650–500 .
All spectra with significant hard X-ray detections were fit using a self-consistent , relativistically-blurred disk reflection model suited to high ionization regimes .
Importantly , we find evidence that both the spectral and timing properties of black hole states may be partially driven by the height of the X-ray corona above the disk , and related changes in how gravitational light bending affects the corona–disk interaction .
Specifically , the evolution of the power-law , thermal disk , and relativistically–convolved reflection components in our spectral analysis indicate that : ( 1 ) the disk inner radius remains constant at { \it r } _ { in } = 1.65 \pm 0.08 ~ { } GM / c ^ { 2 } ( consistent with values found for the ISCO of XTE J1650–500 in other works ) throughout the transition from the brighter phases of the low-hard state to the intermediate states ( both the hard-intermediate and soft-intermediate ) , through to the soft state and back ; ( 2 ) the ratio between the observed reflected X-ray flux and power-law continuum ( the “ reflection fraction ” , R ) increases sharply at the transition between the hard-intermediate and soft-intermediate states ( “ ballistic ” jets are sometimes launched at this transition ) ; ( 3 ) both the frequency and coherence of the high-frequency quasi-periodic oscillations ( QPOs ) observed in XTE J1650–500 increase with R .
We discuss our results in terms of black hole states and the nature of black hole accretion flows across the mass scale .