About the Editors; Foreword; Searching for Black Holes in Space; Introduction; The Origins of X-Ray Astronomy; Cygnus X-1; A0620-00; Supermassive Black Holes in AGN; ULXs and Intermediate Mass Black Holes; Summary and Update; Acknowledgements; References; General Overview of Black Hole Accretion Theory; Introduction; Hydrodynamic Disk Models with the Alpha Prescription; Local Thermal Equilibria and Secular Instabilities; Tying Local Models Into Global Models: The Overall Geometry of the Flow; Other Variants; Going Beyond Alpha: MRI Turbulence

Shearing Box Simulations of MRI Turbulence; Aspects of the Vertical Structure Revealed by MRI Simulations; Physics Issues in the RIAF Regime; Attempts to Simulate the Radiation Pressure Thermal Instability; Other Issues in the Radiation Dominated Regime; Summary; Acknowledgements; References; Fast Variability from Black-Hole Binaries; Introduction; Accretion and General Relativity; Fast Variability and Source States; Hard and Soft States: Noise; Intermediate States: Quasi-Periodic Oscillations; Variability at High-Frequencies; Interpretation; The Relativistic Precession Model

Epicyclic Resonance Models; Disk Oscillation Models; Other Models; QPOs in Accretion Disk Simulations; Conclusion; Acknowledgements; References; Modelling Spectral and Timing Properties of Accreting Black Holes: The Hybrid Hot Flow Paradigm; Introduction; Hot Flow Models; Comptonization Models for the X-Ray Emission; Hybrid Comptonization Model; Basic Properties of Hybrid Accretion Flows; Observational Properties; X-ray/gamma-Ray Spectra; Broad-Band Spectra and Infrared Flares; X-Ray Variability; Optical (IR and UV) Variability and Its Relations to the X-Rays; Polarisation; Summary

Acknowledgements; References; Current Status of Simulations; Introduction; Matching Simulations with Observations; Thermodynamics of Simulations; Geometrically Thin Disks; Self-Consistent Radiative Cooling of Optically Thin Disks; Magnetic Field Topology; Jet Power; Magnetically Arrested Accretion; Tilted Disks; Tilted Disks and Spin; Tilted Disks and Sgr A* Spectral Fitting; Tilted Disks and Strong Shocks; Tilted Disks-GRMHD vs. SPH; Future Direction-Radiation MHD; Acknowledgements; References; Observational Tests of the Picture of Disk Accretion; Introduction

A Basic Picture: Setting a Target for Observations to Test; Classes of Accretors; Evidence for the Basic Structures of Accretion Disks; Proof that Accretion Really Happens in Disks; Systems with Accretion not Happening via Disks; Eclipse Mapping of Accretion Disks; Evidence for Hot Spots; Spiral Structure: Evidence for Deviations from Simple Disk Models; Large Amplitude, Long Timescale Variability; Mechanisms for Large Variations in Luminosity; The Thermal-Viscous Instability and Stability Criteria; Disk Instabilities and Peak Outburst Luminosities; Outburst Durations