225 research outputs found
Iron Emission Lines on the Galactic Ridge Observed with Suzaku
In order to elucidate origin of the Galactic Ridge X-ray Emission, we
analyzed Suzaku data taken at various regions along the Galactic plane and
studied their Fe-K emission line features. Suzaku resolved the Fe line complex
into three narrow lines at ~6.4 keV,~6.7 keV and ~6.97 keV, which are K-lines
from neutral (or low-ionized), He-like, and H-like iron ions, respectively. The
6.7 keV line is clearly seen in all the observed regions and its longitudinal
distribution is consistent with that determined from previous observations. The
6.4 keV emission line was also found in various Galactic plane regions (b~0).
Differences in flux ratios of the 6.4 keV/6.7 keV and 6.97 keV/6.7 keV lines
between the Galactic plane and the Galactic center regions are studied and its
implication is discussed.Comment: Accepted for publication in PASJ Suzaku 3rd special issu
DIOS: the dark baryon exploring mission
DIOS (Diffuse Intergalactic Oxygen Surveyor) is a small satellite aiming for
a launch around 2020 with JAXA's Epsilon rocket. Its main aim is a search for
warm-hot intergalactic medium with high-resolution X-ray spectroscopy of
redshifted emission lines from OVII and OVIII ions. The superior energy
resolution of TES microcalorimeters combined with a very wide field of view
(30--50 arcmin diameter) will enable us to look into gas dynamics of cosmic
plasmas in a wide range of spatial scales from Earth's magnetosphere to
unvirialized regions of clusters of galaxies. Mechanical and thermal design of
the spacecraft and development of the TES calorimeter system are described. We
also consider revising the payload design to optimize the scientific capability
allowed by the boundary conditions of the small mission.Comment: 10 pages, 11 figures, Proceedings of the SPIE Astronomical
Instrumentation : Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2014: Ultraviolet to
Gamma Ra
Suzaku observations of Jovian diffuse hard X-ray emission
We report on results of systematic analyses of the entire three X-ray data sets of Jupiter taken by Suzaku in 2006, 2012, and 2014. Jovian diffuse hard X-ray emission was discovered by Suzaku in 2006 when the solar activity went toward its minimum. The diffuse emission was spatially consistent with the Jovian inner magnetosphere and was spectrally fitted with a flat power-law function suggesting non-thermal emission. Thus, a scenario in which ultra-relativistic (tens of MeV) electrons in the Jovian inner magnetosphere inverse-Comptonize solar visible photons into X-ray bands has been hypothetically proposed. We focused on the dependence of the Jovian diffuse hard X-ray emission on the solar activity to verify this scenario. The solar activity in 2012 and 2014 was around the maximum of the 24th solar cycle. By combining the imaging and spectral analyses for the three data sets, we successfully separated the contribution of the diffuse emission from the emission of Jupiter’s body (i.e., the aurora and disk emission). The 1–5 keV luminosity of the diffuse emission has been stable and did not vary significantly, and did not simply depend on the solar activity, which is also known to affect the high-energy electron distribution in the Jovian inner magnetosphere scarcely. The luminosity of the body emission both in 0.2–1 and 1–5 keV, in contrast, probably depended on the solar activity and varied by a factor of 2–5. These results strongly supported the inverse-Compton scattering scenario by the ultra-relativistic electrons. In this paper, we estimate spatial and spectral distributions of the inverse-Compton scattering X-rays by Jovian magnetospheric high-energy electrons with reference to the Divine–Garrett model and found a possible agreement in an inner region (≲10 RJ) for the X-ray observations
A Catalog of Candidate Intermediate-luminosity X-ray Objects
ROSAT, and now Chandra, X-ray images allow studies of extranuclear X-ray
point sources in galaxies other than our own. X-ray observations of normal
galaxies with ROSAT and Chandra have revealed that off-nuclear, compact,
Intermediate-luminosity (Lx[2-10 keV] >= 1e39 erg/s) X-ray Objects (IXOs,
a.k.a. ULXs [Ultraluminous X-ray sources]) are quite common. Here we present a
catalog and finding charts for 87 IXOs in 54 galaxies, derived from all of the
ROSAT HRI imaging data for galaxies with cz <= 5000 km/s from the Third
Reference Catalog of Bright Galaxies (RC3). We have defined the cutoff Lx for
IXOs so that it is well above the Eddington luminosity of a 1.4 Msun black hole
(10^38.3 erg/s), so as not to confuse IXOs with ``normal'' black hole X-ray
binaries. This catalog is intended to provide a baseline for follow-up work
with Chandra and XMM, and with space- and ground-based survey work at
wavelengths other than X-ray. We demonstrate that elliptical galaxies with IXOs
have a larger number of IXOs per galaxy than non-elliptical galaxies with IXOs,
and note that they are not likely to be merely high-mass X-ray binaries with
beamed X-ray emission, as may be the case for IXOs in starburst galaxies.
Approximately half of the IXOs with multiple observations show X-ray
variability, and many (19) of the IXOs have faint optical counterparts in DSS
optical B-band images. Follow-up observations of these objects should be
helpful in identifying their nature.Comment: 29 pages, ApJS, accepted (catalog v2.0) (full resolution version of
paper and future releases of catalog at http://www.xassist.org/ixocat_hri
Suzaku X-Ray Imaging and Spectroscopy of Cassiopeia A
Suzaku X-ray observations of a young supernova remnant, Cassiopeia A, were
carried out. K-shell transition lines from highly ionized ions of various
elements were detected, including Chromium (Cr-Kalpha at 5.61 keV). The X-ray
continuum spectra were modeled in the 3.4--40 keV band, summed over the entire
remnant, and were fitted with a simplest combination of the thermal
bremsstrahlung and the non-thermal cut-off power-law models. The spectral fits
with this assumption indicate that the continuum emission is likely to be
dominated by the non-thermal emission with a cut-off energy at > 1 keV. The
thermal-to-nonthermal fraction of the continuum flux in the 4-10 keV band is
best estimated as ~0.1. Non-thermal-dominated continuum images in the 4--14 keV
band were made. The peak of the non-thermal X-rays appears at the western part.
The peak position of the TeV gamma-rays measured with HEGRA and MAGIC is also
shifted at the western part with the 1-sigma confidence. Since the location of
the X-ray continuum emission was known to be presumably identified with the
reverse shock region, the possible keV-TeV correlations give a hint that the
accelerated multi-TeV hadrons in Cassiopeia A are dominated by heavy elements
in the reverse shock region.Comment: Publ. Astron. Soc. Japan 61, pp.1217-1228 (2009
The discoveries of uranium 237 and symmetric fission — From the archival papers of Nishina and Kimura
Shortly before the Second World War time, Nishina reported on a series of prominent nuclear physical and radiochemical studies in collaboration with Kimura. They artificially produced 231Th, a member of the natural actinium series of nuclides, by bombarding thorium with fast neutrons. This resulted in the discovery of 237U, a new isotope of uranium, by bombarding uranium with fast neutrons, and confirmed that 237U disintegrates into element 93 with a mass number of 237. They also identified the isotopes of several middle-weighted elements produced by the symmetric fission of uranium. In this review article, the highlights of their work are briefly summarized along with some explanatory commentaries
Suzaku Observations of Charge Exchange Emission from Solar System Objects
Recent results of charge exchange emission from solar system objects observed with the Japanese Suzaku satellite are reviewed. Suzaku is of great importance to investigate diffuse X-ray emission like the charge exchange from planetary exospheres and comets. The Suzaku studies of Earth's exosphere, Martian exosphere, Jupiter's aurorae, and comets are overviewed
Investigation of Diffuse Hard X-ray Emission from the Massive Star-Forming Region NGC 6334
Chandra ACIS-I data of the molecular cloud and HII region complex NGC 6334
were analyzed. The hard X-ray clumps detected with ASCA (Sekimoto et al. 2000)
were resolved into 792 point sources. After removing the point sources, an
extended X-ray emission component was detected over a 5x9 pc2 region, with the
0.5-8 keV absorption-corrected luminosity of 2x10^33 erg/s. The contribution
from faint point sources to this extended emission was estimated as at most ~20
%, suggesting that most of the emission is diffuse in nature. The X-ray
spectrum of the diffuse emission was observed to vary from place to place. In
tenuous molecular cloud regions with hydrogen column density of 0.5~1x10^22
cm-2, the spectrum can be represented by a thermal plasma model with
temperatures of several keV. The spectrum in dense cloud cores exhibits harder
continuum, together with higher absorption more than ~3x10^22 cm-2. In some of
such highly obscured regions, the spectrum show extremely hard continua
equivalent to a photon index of ~1, and favor non-thermal interpretation. These
results are discussed in the context of thermal and non-thermal emissions, both
powered by fast stellar winds from embedded young early-type stars through
shock transitions.Comment: 43 pages, 14 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ, A full
resolution ot the paper can be found at
http://www.astro.isas.jaxa.jp/~ezoe/ngc6334/yezoe2005apj_chandra_ngc6334.pd
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