The Accretion Flow - Discrete Ejection Connection in GRS 1915+105

The microquasar GRS~1915+105 is known for its spectacular discrete ejections. They occur unexpectedly, thus their inception escapes direct observation. It has been shown that the X-ray flux increases in the hours leading up to a major ejection. In this article, we consider the serendipitous interferometric monitoring of a modest version of a discrete ejection described in Reid et al. (2014) that would have otherwise escaped detection in daily radio light curves. The observation begins $\sim 1$ hour after the onset of the ejection, providing unprecedented accuracy on the estimate of the ejection time. The astrometric measurements allow us to determine the time of ejection as $\rm{MJD}\, 56436.274^{+0.016}_{-0.013}$, i.e., within a precision of 41 minutes (95\% confidence). Just like larger flares, we find that the X-ray luminosity increases in last 2 - 4 hours preceding ejection. Our finite temporal resolution indicates that this elevated X-ray flux persists within $21.8^{+22.6}_{-19.1}$ minutes of the ejection with 95\% confidence, the highest temporal precision of the X-ray - superluminal ejection connection to date. This observation provides direct evidence that the physics that launches major flares occurs on smaller scales as well (lower radio flux and shorter ejection episodes). The observation of a X-ray spike prior to a discrete ejection, although of very modest amplitude suggests that the process linking accretion behavior to ejection is general from the smallest scales to high luminosity major superluminal flares.Comment: To appear in Ap

XMM-Newton observations of five INTEGRAL sources located towards the Scutum Arm

Results are presented for XMM-Newton observations of five hard X-ray sources discovered by INTEGRAL in the direction of the Scutum Arm. Each source received more than 20 ks of effective exposure time. We provide refined X-ray positions for all five targets enabling us to pinpoint the most likely counterpart in optical/infrared archives. Spectral and timing information (much of which are provided for the first time) allow us to give a firm classification for IGR J18462-0223 and to offer tentative classifications for the others. For IGR J18462-0223, we discovered a coherent pulsation period of 997+-1 s which we attribute to the spin of a neutron star in a highly-obscured (nH = 2e23 /cm2) high-mass X-ray binary (HMXB). This makes IGR J18462-0223 the seventh supergiant fast X-ray transient (SFXT) candidate with a confirmed pulsation period. IGR J18457+0244 is a highly-absorbed (nH = 8e23 /cm2) source in which the possible detection of an iron line suggests an active galactic nucleus (AGN) of type Sey-2 situated at z = 0.07(1). A periodic signal at 4.4 ks could be a quasi-periodic oscillation which would make IGR J18457+0244 one of a handful of AGN in which such features have been claimed, but a slowly-rotating neutron star in an HMXB can not be ruled out. IGR J18482+0049 represents a new obscured HMXB candidate with nH = 4e23 /cm2. We tentatively propose that IGR J18532+0416 is either an AGN or a pulsar in an HMXB system. The X-ray spectral properties of IGR J18538-0102 are consistent with the AGN classification that has been proposed for this source.Comment: 15 pages, 9 figures, 4 tables: accepted for publication in Ap