arXivDaily arXiv每日学术速递 周一至周五更新
arXiv 2401.16616astro-ph.HE
收藏

NuSTAR 对英仙座星系团的观测:ICM 与一个奇特的硬 X 射线超出

The NuSTAR View of Perseus: the ICM and a Peculiar Hard Excess

Samantha Creech, Daniel R. Wik, Steven Rossland, Ayşegül Tümer, Ka-Wah Wong, Stephen A. Walker

AI总结:

本文利用新软件 nucrossarf 修正 NuSTAR 的 PSF 散射光,分析英仙座星系团 ICM 的硬 X 射线辐射,发现 20 keV 以上存在约 10% 的非热超出,并排除了逆康普顿等解释,同时给出磁场下限和系统不确定度表征。

摘要:

作为 X 射线天空中最亮的星系团,英仙座星系团是研究星系团内介质(ICM)的绝佳目标,但直到最近,其活动星系核(AGN)使得利用 NuSTAR 对其中心附近弥散辐射的研究几乎无法完成,原因是 NuSTAR 点扩散函数(PSF)的扩展翼。一个新的开源软件包——nucrossarf——的开发,现在允许对点源和弥散源的贡献进行建模,从而能够考虑来自 AGN 的散射光。利用这一技术,我们使用三次 NuSTAR 对英仙座星系团的档案观测,对来自 ICM 的弥散硬 X 射线(3-25 keV)辐射进行了分析。我们发现,在 20 keV 以上存在约 10% 的超出辐射,无法用纯热模型描述。通过对档案观测中的 AGN 进行类似分析,我们确定了建模 AGN 贡献的系统不确定度为 3.4%。然而,为了解释这一超出,总的散射 AGN 辐射必须比我们测量到的强 39%。我们检验了对该超出的物理解释,例如可能源自射电微晕的弥散逆康普顿辐射,但我们确定没有一种模型具有说服力。我们推导出逆康普顿通量的上限($\leq1.5\times10^{-11}$ erg s$^{-1}$ cm$^{-2}$)以及相应的全局磁场强度下限($\geq 0.35~\mu$G)。我们讨论了该超出的潜在起源和意义,并给出了我们对 nucrossarf 系统不确定度的表征,这应该对未来的工作有用。

英文摘要:

As the brightest galaxy cluster in the X-ray sky, Perseus is an excellent target for studying the Intracluster Medium (ICM), but until recently, its active galactic nucleus (AGN) made studies of the diffuse emission near its center nearly impossible to accomplish with NuSTAR due to the extended wings of NuSTAR's PSF. The development of a new open source software package -- nucrossarf -- now allows the contribution from point and diffuse sources to be modeled so that scattered light from the AGN can be accounted for. Using this technique, we present an analysis of diffuse hard X-ray (3-25keV) emission from the ICM using three archival NuSTAR observations of the Perseus cluster. We find a ~10% excess of emission beyond 20keV not describable by purely thermal models. By performing similar analyses of AGN in archival observations, we have characterized the systematic uncertainty of the modeled AGN contribution to be 3.4%. However, in order to explain the excess, the total scattered AGN emission would have to be 39% stronger than we have measured. We test physical explanations for the excess, such as diffuse inverse Compton emission potentially originating from the radio mini-halo, but we determine that none of the models are compelling. An upper limit on inverse Compton flux ($\leq1.5\times10^{-11}$erg s$^{-1}$cm$^{-2}$) and a corresponding lower limit on global magnetic field strength ($\geq 0.35~μG$) is derived. We discuss the potential origin and implications of the excess and present our characterization of the nucrossarf systematic uncertainty, which should be useful for future work.

机构、总结、中文摘要均由AI分析而来,可能存在错误,请以论文正文为准。

↑