No Arabic abstract
We present the analysis of a deep Chandra observation of a ~2L_* late-type galaxy, ESO 137-002, in the closest rich cluster A3627. The Chandra data reveal a long (>40 kpc) and narrow tail with a nearly constant width (~3 kpc) to the southeast of the galaxy, and a leading edge ~1.5 kpc from the galaxy center on the upstream side of the tail. The tail is most likely caused by the nearly edge-on stripping of ESO 137-002s ISM by ram pressure, compared to the nearly face-on stripping of ESO 137-001 discussed in our previous work. Spectral analysis of individual regions along the tail shows that the gas throughout it has a rather constant temperature, ~1 keV, very close to the temperature of the tails of ESO 137-001, if the same atomic database is used. The derived gas abundance is low (~0.2 solar with the single-kT model), an indication of the multiphase nature of the gas in the tail. The mass of the X-ray tail is only a small fraction (<5%) of the initial ISM mass of the galaxy, suggesting that the stripping is most likely at an early stage. However, with any of the single-kT, double-kT and multi-kT models we tried, the tail is always over-pressured relative to the surrounding ICM, which could be due to the uncertainties in the abundance, thermal vs. non-thermal X-ray emission, or magnetic support in the ICM. The H-alpha data from SOAR show a ~21 kpc tail spatially coincident with the X-ray tail, as well as a secondary tail (~12 kpc long) to the east of the main tail diverging at an angle of ~23 degrees and starting at a distance of ~7.5 kpc from the nucleus. At the position of the secondary H-alpha tail, the X-ray emission is also enhanced at the ~2 sigma level. We compare the tails of ESO 137-001 and ESO 137-002, and also compare the tails to simulations. Both the similarities and differences of the tails pose challenges to the simulations. Several implications are briefly discussed.
The impact of ram pressure stripping (RPS) on galaxy evolution has been studied for over forty years. Recent multi-wavelength data have revealed many examples of galaxies undergoing RPS, often accompanied with multi-phase tails. As energy transfer in the multi-phase medium is an outstanding question in astrophysics, RPS galaxies are great objects to study. Despite the recent burst of observational evidence, the relationship between gas in different phases in the RPS tails is poorly known. Here we report, for the first time, a strong linear correlation between the X-ray surface brightness (SB$_{rm X}$) and the H$alpha$ surface brightness (SB$_{rm Halpha}$) of the diffuse gas in the RPS tails at $sim$ 10 kpc scales, as SB$_{rm X}$/SB$_{rm Halpha} sim$ 3.6. This discovery supports the mixing of the stripped interstellar medium (ISM) with the hot intracluster medium (ICM) as the origin of the multi-phase RPS tails. The established relation in stripped tails, also in comparison with the likely similar correlation in similar environments like X-ray cool cores and galactic winds, provides an important test for models of energy transfer in the multi-phase gas. It also indicates the importance of the H$alpha$ data for our understanding of the ICM clumping and turbulence.
Identification of Abell 3120 as a galaxy cluster has recently been questioned with alternative suggestions including: a fossil remnant of a group merger, non-thermal emission from a radio galaxy, and projected emission from of a filamentary string of galaxies. We report on our analysis of the Chandra observation and evaluate these hypotheses based on our results. Abell 3120 shows X-ray emission extending 158 kpc, well beyond the central galaxy. The spatial distribution of X-rays in the core more closely follows the radio emission showing a jet-like structure extending to the north that is misaligned with the stellar light distribution of the central galaxy. At larger radii the X-ray emission is aligned with the SE-NW running axis of the galaxy distribution in the cluster core. Modeling the X-ray spectrum excludes purely non-thermal emission. The emission weighted temperature is 1.93 - 2.19 keV and the 0.3 - 10 keV luminosity is 1.23$times10^{43}$ ergs s$^{-1}$. Abell 3120 appears to be a poor cluster with Virgo and MKW 4 as peers. The best fitting model consists of a thermal component and a second component that may be either thermal or non-thermal, with luminosity 25% of the total X-ray luminosity. While, a more detailed spatial-spectral search failed to detect a central AGN, there is some evidence for an extended hard X-ray component. Cooler gas, 1.28 - 1.80 was detected in the central 20 kpc. The second thermal component marginally requires a higher redshift, >0.12, which may be due to a second cluster in the rich surrounding environment consisting of nearly a thousand catalogued galaxies.
We present an X-ray spectral analysis of the nearby double radio relic merging cluster Abell 3376 ($z$ = 0.046), observed with the $Suzaku$ XIS instrument. These deep ($sim$360 ks) observations cover the entire double relic region in the outskirts of the cluster. These diffuse radio structures are amongst the largest and arc-shaped relics observed in combination with large-scale X-ray shocks in a merging cluster. We confirm the presence of a stronger shock (${cal M}_{rm{W}}$ = 2.8 $pm~0.4$) in the western direction at $rsim26$, derived from a temperature and surface brightness discontinuity across the radio relic. In the East, we detect a weaker shock (${cal M}_{rm{E}}$ = 1.5 $pm~0.1$) at $rsim8$, possibly associated to the notch of eastern relic, and a cold front at $rsim3$. Based on the shock speed calculated from the Mach numbers, we estimate that the dynamical age of the shock front is $sim$0.6 Gyr after core passage, indicating that Abell 3376 is still an evolving merging cluster and that the merger is taking place close to the plane of the sky. These results are consistent with simulations and optical and weak lensing studies from the literature.
We present spectroscopic observations of the Be/X-ray binary X Per obtained during the period 1999 - 2018. Using new and published data, we found that during disc-rise the expansion velocity of the circumstellar disc is 0.4 - 0.7 km/s. Our results suggest that the disc radius in recent decades show evidence of resonant truncation of the disc by resonances 10:1, 3:1, and 2:1, while the maximum disc size is larger than the Roche lobe of the primary and smaller than the closest approach of the neutron star. We find correlation between equivalent width of H-alpha emission line ($Walpha$) and the X-ray flux, which is visible when $15 : AA : < Walpha le 40 : AA$. The correlation is probably due to wind Roche lobe overflow.
We present the first analysis of the X-ray warm absorber and nuclear obscuration in the Seyfert 1.8 galaxy ESO 113-G010. We used archival data from a 100 ks XMM-Newton observation made in 2005. From high resolution spectroscopy analysis of the RGS data, we detect absorption lines originating from a warm absorber consisting of two distinct phases of ionisation, with log xi ~ 3.2 and 2.3 respectively. The higher-ionised component has a larger column density and outflow velocity (N_H ~ 1.6 x 10^22 cm^-2, v ~ -1100 km/s) than the lower-ionised component (N_H ~ 0.5 x 10^22 cm^-2, v ~ -700 km/s). The shape of the optical-UV continuum and the large Balmer decrement (H_alpha/H_beta ~ 8) indicate significant amount of reddening is taking place in our line of sight in the host galaxy of the AGN; however, the X-ray spectrum is not absorbed by cold neutral gas intrinsic to the source. We discuss different explanations for this discrepancy between the reddening and the X-ray absorption, and suggest that the most likely solution is a dusty warm absorber. We show that dust can exist in the lower-ionised phase of the warm absorber, which causes the observed reddening of the optical-UV emission, whereas the X-rays remain unabsorbed due to lack of cold neutral gas in the ionised warm absorber. Furthermore, we have investigated the uncertainties in the construction of the Spectral Energy Distribution (SED) of this object due to obscuration of the nuclear source and the effects this has on the photoionisation modelling of the warm absorber. We show how the assumed SEDs influence the thermal stability of each phase and whether or not the two absorber phases in ESO 113-G010 can co-exist in pressure equilibrium.