A Study of the Populations of X-ray Sources in the Small Magellanic Cloud with ASCA

Details A Study of the Populations of X-ray Sources in the Small Magellanic Cloud with ASCA A Study of the Populations of X-ray Sources in the Small Magellanic Cloud with ASCA

2000-02-08

arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0002167v1

Astrophys.J.Suppl. 128 (2000) 491-510

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astrophysics

11 pages, 39 Figures, to be published in ApJ Supplement. Tables (body and figures also) are available at http://www-cr.scphy

Scientific paper

10.1086/313394

The Advanced Satellite for Cosmology and Astrophysics (ASCA) has made multiple observations of the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC). X-ray mosaic images in the soft (0.7--2.0 keV) and hard (2.0--7.0 keV) bands are separately constructed, and the latter provides the first hard X-ray view of the SMC. We extract 39 sources from the two-band images with a criterion of S/N>5, and conduct timing and spectral analyses for all of these sources. Coherent pulsations are detected from 12 X-ray sources; five of which are new discoveries. Most of the 12 X-ray pulsars are found to exhibit long-term flux variabilities, hence they are likely to be X-ray binary pulsars (XBPs). On the other hand, we classify four supernova remnants (SNRs) as thermal SNRs, because their spectra exhibit emission lines from highly ionized atoms. We find that XBPs and thermal SNRs in the SMC can be clearly separated by their hardness ratio (the ratio of the count rate between the hard and soft bands). Using this empirical grouping, we find many XBP candidates in the SMC, although no pulsations have yet been detected from these sources. Possible implications on the star-formation history and evolution of the SMC are presented by a comparison of the source populations in the SMC and our Galaxy.

Affiliated with

Also associated with

No associations

Rating

A Study of the Populations of X-ray Sources in the Small Magellanic Cloud with ASCA does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.

If you have personal experience with A Study of the Populations of X-ray Sources in the Small Magellanic Cloud with ASCA, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and A Study of the Populations of X-ray Sources in the Small Magellanic Cloud with ASCA will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

Comments { 0 }

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-558219