Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astronomy
Scientific paper
Feb 2010
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2010head...11.1112p&link_type=abstract
American Astronomical Society, HEAD meeting #11, #11.12; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 41, p.673
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astronomy
Scientific paper
The study of the X-ray emission from the Galactic Centre (GC) Molecular Clouds (MC), within 15 arcmin from SgrA*, will be presented. We use XMM-Newton data (about 1.2 Ms of observation time) spanning about 8 years. The MC spectra show all the features characteristic of reflection: intense FeKα, with EW of about 0.7-1 keV, and the associated Kβ line; flat power law continuum and significant FeK edge. The diffuse lowly ionised FeK emission follows the MC distribution, nevertheless not all MC are FeK emitters. The long baseline monitoring allows the characterisation of the temporal evolution of the MC emission, showing a complex pattern of significant variations. In particular, we observe an apparent super-luminal motion of a light front illuminating a Molecular nebula. This might be due to a source outside the MC (such as SgrA* or a bright and long outburst of a X-ray binary), while it can not be due to low energy cosmic rays or a source located inside the cloud. We also observe a decrease of the X-ray emission from G0.11-0.11, behaviour similar to the one of SgrB2. The line intensities, clouds dimensions, columns densities and positions with respect to SgrA*, are consistent with being produced by the same SgrA* flare. The required high luminosity (about 1.5×1039 erg s-1) can hardly be produced by an binary system, while it is in agreement with a flare of SgrA* fading about 100 years ago. The low intensity of the FeK emission coming from the 50 and the 20 km s^-1 MC places an upper limit of 3×1035 erg s^-1 to the mean luminosity of SgrA* in the last 60-90 years. The FeK emission and variations from these MC might have been produced by a single flare of SgrA*.
Bélanger Guillaume
Goldwurm Andréa
Ponti Gabriele
Terrier Régis
Trap Guillaume
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