Basic properties of toroidal structures in Kerr--de Sitter backgrounds

Perfect fluid tori with uniform distribution of the specific angular momentum orbiting the Kerr-de Sitter black holes or naked singularities are studied. Closed equipotential surfaces corresponding to stationary toroidal discs are allowed only in the spacetimes admitting stable circular geodesics. The last closed surface crosses itself in the cusp(s) enabling outflow(s) of matter from the torus due to the violation of hydrostatic equilibrium. The repulsive cosmological constant, $\Lambda >0$, implies the existence of the outer cusp (with a stabilizing effect on the tori because of "excretion", i.e., outflow of matter from the torus into the outer space) and the strong collimation of open equipotential surfaces along the rotational axis. Both the effects take place nearby the so-called static radius where the gravitational attraction is just balanced by the cosmic repulsion. The plus-family discs (which are always corotating in the black-hole backgrounds but can be counterrotating, even with negative energy of the fluid elements, in some naked singularity backgrounds) are thicker and more extended than the minus-family ones (which are always counterrotating in all backgrounds). If the parameters of naked-singularity spacetimes are very close to the parameters of extreme black-hole spacetimes, the family of possible disc-like configurations includes members with two isolated discs where the inner one is always a counterrotating accretion disc. Mass estimates for tori with nonrelativistic adiabatic equation of state give limits on their central mass-density, for which the approximation of test fluid is adequate.Comment: Updated version of the Section talk at Albert Einstein Century International Conference at Palais de l'Unesco, Paris, France, 18-23 July, 2005; to appear in the Proceedings; AIP style files included; 8 page

Toroidal LNRF-velocity profiles in thick accretion discs orbiting rapidly rotating Kerr black holes

We show that in the equatorial plane of marginally stable thick discs (with uniformly distributed specific angular momentum the orbital velocity relative to the locally non-rotating frames (LNRF) has a positive radial gradient in the vicinity of black holes with spin a>0.99979. The change of sign of the velocity gradient occurs just above the center of the thick toroidal discs, in the region where stable circular geodesics of the Kerr spacetime are allowed. The global character of the phenomenon is given in terms of topology changes of the von Zeipel surfaces (equivalent to the equivelocity surfaces in the tori with constant specific angular momentum distribution). Toroidal von Zeipel surfaces exist around the circle corresponding to the minimum of the equatorial LNRF velocity profile, indicating a possibility of development of some vertical instabilities in those parts of marginally stable tori with positive gradient of the LNRF velocity. Eventual oscillatory frequencies connected with the phenomenon are given in a coordinate-independent form.Comment: Updated version of the Section talk at Albert Einstein Century International Conference at Palais de l'Unesco, Paris, France, 18-23 July, 2005; to appear in the Proceedings; AIP style files included; 8 page

Non-monotonic Keplerian velocity profiles around near-extreme braneworld Kerr black holes

We study the non-monotonic Keplerian velocity profiles related to locally non-rotating frames (LNRF) in the field of near-extreme braneworld Kerr black holes and naked singularities in which the non-local gravitational effects of the bulk are represented by a braneworld tidal charge $b$ and the 4D geometry of the spacetime structure is governed by the Kerr-Newman geometry. We show that positive tidal charge has a tendency to restrict the values of the black hole dimensionless spin $a$ admitting existence of the non-monotonic Keplerian LNRF-velocity profiles; the non-monotonic profiles exist in the black hole spacetimes with tidal charge smaller than $b=0.41005$ (and spin larger than $a=0.76808$). With decreasing value of the tidal charge (which need not be only positive), both the region of spin allowing the non-monotonicity in the LNRF-velocity profile around braneworld Kerr black hole and the velocity difference in the minimum-maximum parts of the velocity profile increase implying growing astrophysical relevance of this phenomenon

Relativistic and Newtonian fluid tori with electric charge

We discuss the effects of electric charging on the equilibrium configurations of magnetized, rotating fluid tori around black holes of different mass. In the context of gaseous/dusty tori in galactic nuclei, the central black hole dominates the gravitational field and it remains electrically neutral, while the surrounding material acquires some electric charge and exhibits non-negligible self-gravitational effect on the torus structure. The structure of the torus is influenced by the balance between the gravitational and electromagnetic forces. A cusp may develop even in Newtonian tori due to the charge distribution.Comment: 5 pages, 1 figure; to appear in Proceedings of the 15th Marcel Grossman Meeting on General Relativity - the session AC3 on "Accretion Discs and Jets" by Eva Hackmann & Audrey Trova (Rome, 1-7 July 2018), edited by Elia Battistelli, Robert T. Jantzen, and Remo Ruffini, in preparatio

Fish Tank Granuloma Caused by Mycobacterium marinum in Two Aquarists: Two Case Reports

Mycobacterium marinum, the cause of chronic systemic infections in fish, occasionally causes granulomatous skin and soft tissue lesions in humans. Cutaneous mycobacterial infection in two patients owing to unusual circumstances is presented in this report. The first patient was infected through improper hygienic behavior, while infection in the second patient was previously misdiagnosed as rheumatoid arthritis and treated with methylprednisolone for a period of three months, which resulted in a rare systemic spread of M. marinum into the bones of the hand, testis, and epididymis. Simultaneously, screening for possible sources of M. marinum infection in patients' aquaria revealed positive fish harboring VNTR profiles identical to those obtained for clinical isolates from patients