ترغب بنشر مسار تعليمي؟ اضغط هنا

The Low-Mass X-ray Binary and Globular Cluster Connection in Virgo Cluster Early-type Galaxies: Optical Properties

71   0   0.0 ( 0 )
 نشر من قبل Gregory Sivakoff
 تاريخ النشر 2006
  مجال البحث فيزياء
والبحث باللغة English




اسأل ChatGPT حول البحث

(Abridged) Chandra and Hubble ACS observations of 11 early-type galaxies probe the low-mass X-ray binary (LMXB) - globular cluster (GC) connection. We explore the optical properties of 270 GCs with LMXBs and 6,488 GCs without LMXBs. More massive, redder, and more compact GCs are more likely to contain LMXBs. Unlike Galactic GCs, a large number of GCs with LMXBs have half-mass relaxation times > 2.5 Gyr. We fit the dependence of the expected number of LMXBs per GC, lambda_t, on the GC mass M, color (g-z), and half-mass radius r_{h,cor}, and find that lambda_t propto M^{1.24pm0.08} 10^{0.9^{+0.2}_{-0.1} (g-z)} r_{h,cor}^{-2.2^{+0.3}_{-0.4}}. Our fit rules out that the number of LMXBs per GC is linearly proportional to GC mass and that most GCs with high X-ray luminosities contain a single LMXB. The detailed dependence of lambda_t on GC properties appears essentially equivalent to a dependence on the encounter rate Gamma_h and the metallicity Z, lambda_t propto Gamma_h^{0.82pm0.05} Z^{0.39pm0.07}. Our analysis provides strong evidence that dynamical formation and metallicity play the primary roles in determining the presence of an LMXB in extragalactic GCs. The shallower than linear dependence for our sample requires an explanation by theories of dynamical binary formation. The abundance dependence is consistent with a metallicity-dependent variation in the number o neutron stars and black holes per unit mass GC, effects from irradiation induced winds or suppression of magnetic braking in metal-poor stars.

قيم البحث

اقرأ أيضاً

We present the results of a Chandra/HST study of the point sources of the NGC 4472. We identify 144 X-ray sources, 72 with HST matches. The optical data show 1102 sources, 829 with globular cluster colors. Thirty matches are found - likely to be low mass X-ray binaries in globular clusters, while 42 have no optical counterparts to V~25 and I~24 - likely predominantly LMXBs in the field star population. Thus approximately 40% of the X-ray sources are in globular clusters and ~4% of the globular clusters contain X-ray sources. The blue GC sources may have harder X-ray spectra than the red GC sources. No significant differences are found between the X-ray properties of the field sources and of the GC sources. This study, along with our previous result from Paper I in this series on the similarity of the spatial profile of the field LMXBs, globular cluster LMXBs, and the globular clusters themselves suggest that a significant fraction of the observed low mass X-ray binaries in the field may be created in a globular cluster then ejected into the field by stellar interaction s; however, by comparing the results for NGC 4472 with those in several other galaxies, we find tentative evidence for a correlation be tween the globular cluster specific frequency and the fraction of LMXBs in globular clusters, a correlation which would be most easily explained if some of the field sources were generated in situ. We show that isolated accreting very massive black holes are unlikely to be observable with current X-ray instrumentation and that these sources hence do not contaminate the LMXB population. We discuss the possibility that several equatorial point sources may indicate the presence of a disk wind responsible for the low radiative efficiency observed in the nucleus of this source. (abridged)
We present a wide field study of the Globular Clusters/Low Mass X-ray Binaries connection in the cD elliptical NGC1399, combining HST/ACS and Chandra high resolution data. We find evidence that LMXB formation likelihood is influenced by GCs structura l parameters, in addition to the well known effects of mass and metallicity, independently from galactocentric distance.
We study the UV properties of a volume limited sample of early-type galaxies in the Virgo cluster combining new GALEX far- (1530 A) and near-ultraviolet (2310 A) data with spectro-photometric data available at other wavelengths. The sample includes 2 64 ellipticals, lenticulars and dwarfs spanning a large range in luminosity (M(B)<-15). While the NUV to optical or near-IR color magnitude relations (CMR) are similar to those observed at optical wavelengths, with a monotonic reddening of the color index with increasing luminosity, the (FUV-V) and (FUV-H) CMRs show a discontinuity between massive and dwarf objects. An even more pronounced dichotomy is observed in the (FUV-NUV) CMR. For ellipticals the (FUV-NUV) color becomes bluer with increasing luminosity and with increasing reddening of the optical or near-IR color indices. For the dwarfs the opposite trend is observed. These observational evidences are consistent with the idea that the UV emission is dominated by hot, evolved stars in giant systems, while in dwarf ellipticals residual star formation activity is more common.
Studies of nearby elliptical and S0 galaxies reveal that roughly half of the low mass X-ray binaries (LMXBs), which are luminous tracers of accreting neutron star or black hole systems, are in clusters. There is a surprising tendency of LMXBs to be p referentially associated with metal-rich globular clusters (GCs), with metal-rich GCs hosting three times as many LMXBs as metal-poor ones. There is no convincing evidence of a correlation with GC age so far. In some galaxies the LMXB formation rate varies with GC color even within the metal-rich peak of the typical bimodal cluster metallicity distribution. This provides some of the strongest evidence to date that there are metallicity variations within the metal-rich GC peak, as is expected in hierarchical galaxy formation scenarios. We also note that apparent correlations between the interaction rates in GCs and LMXB frequency may not be reliable because of the uncertainties in some GC parameters. We argue in fact that there are considerable uncertainties in the integrated properties of even the Milky Way clusters that are often overlooked.
59 - S. S. Larsen 2001
We present a study of globular clusters (GCs) in 17 relatively nearby early-type galaxies, based on deep HST/WFPC2 F555W and F814W images. We compare color distributions, cluster sizes and luminosity functions with those of GCs in the Milky Way. In n early all cases, a KMM test returns a high confidence level for the hypothesis that a sum of two Gaussians provides a better fit to the observed color distribution than a single Gaussian, although histograms of the V-I distribution are not always obviously bimodal. The blue and red peak colors both correlate with absolute host galaxy B band magnitude and central velocity dispersion (at about the 2-3 sigma level), but we see no clear correlation with host galaxy V-I or J-K color. Red GCs are generally smaller than blue GCs by about 20%. The size difference is seen at all radii and exists also in the Milky Way and Sombrero (M104) spiral galaxies. Fitting t5 functions to the luminosity functions of blue and red GC populations separately, we find that the V-band turn-over of the blue GCs is generally brighter than that of the red ones by about 0.3 mag, as expected if the two GC populations have similar ages and mass distributions but different metallicities. Brighter than M_V ~ -7.5, the luminosity functions (LFs) are well approximated by power-laws with an exponent of about -1.75. This is similar to the LF for young star clusters, suggesting that young and old globular clusters form by the same basic mechanism. We discuss scenarios for GC formation and conclude that our data appear to favor ``in-situ models in which all GCs in a galaxy formed after the main body of the proto-galaxy had assembled into a single potential well.
التعليقات
جاري جلب التعليقات جاري جلب التعليقات
سجل دخول لتتمكن من متابعة معايير البحث التي قمت باختيارها
mircosoft-partner

هل ترغب بارسال اشعارات عن اخر التحديثات في شمرا-اكاديميا