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Register a new userPossible phase-dependent absorption feature in the x-ray spectrum of the middle-aged PSR J0659+1414
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Added by
Prakash Arumugasamy
Publication date
2018
fields
Physics
and research's language is
English
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We report on the energy-resolved timing and phase-resolved spectral analysis of X-ray emission from PSR J0659+1414 observed with XMM-Newton and NuSTAR. We find that the new data rule out the previously suggested model of the phase-dependent spectrum as a three-component (2 blackbodies + power-law) continuum, which shows large residuals between $0.3-0.7$ keV. Fitting neutron star atmosphere models or several blackbodies to the spectrum does not provide a better description of the spectrum, and requires spectral model components with unrealistically large emission region sizes. The fits improve significantly if we add a phase-dependent absorption feature with central energy $0.5-0.6$ keV and equivalent width up to $approx 50$ eV. We detected the feature for about half of the pulse cycle. Energy-resolved pulse profiles support the description of the spectrum with a three-component continuum and an absorption component. The absorption feature could be interpreted as an electron cyclotron line originating in the pulsar magnetosphere and broadened by the non-uniformity of the magnetic field along the line of sight. The significant phase-variability in the thermal emission from the entire stellar surface may indicate multi-polar magnetic fields and a non-uniform temperature distribution. The strongly pulsed non-thermal spectral component detected with NuSTAR in the $3-20$ keV range is well fit by a power-law model with a photon index $Gamma=1.5pm0.2$.
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We present an X-ray spectral and timing analysis of two $NuSTAR$ observations of the transient Be X-ray binary SAX J2103.5+4545 during its April 2016 outburst, which was characterized by the highest flux since $NuSTAR$s launch. These observations provide detailed hard X-ray spectra of this source during its bright precursor flare and subsequent fainter regular outburst for the first time. In this work, we model the phase-averaged spectra for these observations with a negative and positive power law with an exponential cut-off (NPEX) model and compare the pulse profiles at different flux states. We found that the broad-band pulse profile changes from a three peaked pulse in the first observation to a two peaked pulse in the second observation, and that each of the pulse peaks has some energy dependence. We also perform pulse-phase spectroscopy and fit phase-resolved spectra with NPEX to evaluate how spectral parameters change with pulse phase. We find that while the continuum parameters are mostly constant with pulse phase, a weak absorption feature at ~12 keV that might, with further study, be classified as a cyclotron line, does show strong pulse phase dependence.
Electrons/positrons produced in a pulsar magnetosphere emit synchrotron radiation, which is widely believed as the origin of the non-thermal X-ray emission detected from pulsars. Particles are produced by curvature photons emitted from accelerated particles in the magnetosphere. These curvature photons are detected as pulsed $gamma$-ray emissions from pulsars with age $lesssim10^6$ yr. Using $gamma$-ray observations and analytical model, we impose severe constraints on the synchrotron radiation as a mechanism of the non-thermal X-ray emission. In most middle-aged pulsars ($sim10^5-10^6$ yr) which photon-photon pair production is less efficient in their magnetosphere, we find that the synchrotron radiation model is difficult to explain the observed non-thermal X-ray emission.
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