Probing Deeply into the Inner Jets of Blazars
Alan Marscher (Boston University)
Quasars and other active galactic nuclei with relativistic plasma jets
pointing almost directly at us are collectively called "blazars." Because
of the near-light-speed motions and dynamic conditions, blazars are famous
for rapid variability of their brightness across the electromagnetic
spectrum, including occasional major outbursts of radiation. Our group
monitors blazars with a wide range of instruments to obtain sequences of
images of the jets as well as well-sampled light curves in
flux and polarization. This rich dataset is now allowing us to use
variability to investigate the physical structure and activity of the jets
closer to the accreting supermassive black hole that powers quasars than
has been possible before. I will report on our recent findings, including
the combination of our program with gamma-ray light curves
collected by the newly launched Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope.
