The Novel Obscured State of Stellar-mass Black Hole GRS 1915+105

Understand

GRS 1915$+$105 is a stellar-mass black hole that is well known for exhibiting at least 12 distinct classes of X-ray variability and correlated multi-wavelength behavior.

• Despite such extraordinary variability, GRS 1915$+$105 remained one of the brightest sources in the X-ray sky.
• However, in early 2019, the source became much fainter, apparently entering a new accretion state.
• Here, we report the results of an extensive, year-long monitoring campaign of GRS 1915$+$105 with the Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory.