Multitemperature Blackbody Spectra of Thin Accretion Disks with and without a Zero-Torque Inner Boundary Condition

The standard spectral model for analyzing the soft component of thermal emission from a thin accretion disk around a black hole is the multitemperature blackbody model. The widely used implementation of this model, which is known as diskbb, assumes nonzero torque at the inner edge of the accretion disk. This assumption is contrary to the classic and current literature on thin-disk accretion, which advocates the use of a zero-torque boundary condition. Consequently, we have written code for a zero-torque model, ezdiskbb, which we compare to the nonzero-torque model diskbb by fitting Rossi X-Ray Timing Explorer spectra of three well-known black hole binaries: 4U 1543-47, XTE J1550-564, and GRO J1655-40. The chief difference we find is that the zero-torque model gives a value for the inner disk radius that is ~2.2 times smaller than the value given by diskbb. This result has important implications, especially for the determination of black hole angular momentum and mass accretion rate.