Exploring the case for hard-X-ray beaming in NGC 6946 X-1

Fuente: arXiv
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Hauptverfasser: Beuchert, Tobias, Middleton, Matthew J., Soria, Roberto, Miller-Jones, James C. A., Dauser, Thomas, Roberts, Timothy P., Sathyaprakash, Rajath, Markoff, Sera
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2024
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author Beuchert, Tobias
Middleton, Matthew J.
Soria, Roberto
Miller-Jones, James C. A.
Dauser, Thomas
Roberts, Timothy P.
Sathyaprakash, Rajath
Markoff, Sera
author_facet Beuchert, Tobias
Middleton, Matthew J.
Soria, Roberto
Miller-Jones, James C. A.
Dauser, Thomas
Roberts, Timothy P.
Sathyaprakash, Rajath
Markoff, Sera
contents In order to understand the nature of super-Eddington accretion we must explore both the emission emerging directly from the inflow and its impact on the surroundings. In this paper we test whether we can use the optical line emission of spatially resolved, ionized nebulae around ultraluminous X-ray sources (ULXs) as a proxy for their X-ray luminosity. We choose the ULX NGC 6946 X-1 and its nebula, MF16, as a test case. By studying how the nebular optical line emission responds to assumed irradiation, we can infer the degree to which we require the UV or X-ray emission from the inflow to be collimated by optically thick winds seemingly ubiquitously associated with ULXs. We find that the nebula is highly sensitive to compact UV emission but mostly insensitive to hard X-rays. Our attempts to quantify the beaming of the soft and hard X-rays therefore strongly depends on the UV luminosity of the ULX in the center of the nebula. We find that it is not possible to conclude a lack of geometrical beaming of hard X-rays from such sources via nebula feedback.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2408_07751
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Exploring the case for hard-X-ray beaming in NGC 6946 X-1
Beuchert, Tobias
Middleton, Matthew J.
Soria, Roberto
Miller-Jones, James C. A.
Dauser, Thomas
Roberts, Timothy P.
Sathyaprakash, Rajath
Markoff, Sera
High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena
In order to understand the nature of super-Eddington accretion we must explore both the emission emerging directly from the inflow and its impact on the surroundings. In this paper we test whether we can use the optical line emission of spatially resolved, ionized nebulae around ultraluminous X-ray sources (ULXs) as a proxy for their X-ray luminosity. We choose the ULX NGC 6946 X-1 and its nebula, MF16, as a test case. By studying how the nebular optical line emission responds to assumed irradiation, we can infer the degree to which we require the UV or X-ray emission from the inflow to be collimated by optically thick winds seemingly ubiquitously associated with ULXs. We find that the nebula is highly sensitive to compact UV emission but mostly insensitive to hard X-rays. Our attempts to quantify the beaming of the soft and hard X-rays therefore strongly depends on the UV luminosity of the ULX in the center of the nebula. We find that it is not possible to conclude a lack of geometrical beaming of hard X-rays from such sources via nebula feedback.
title Exploring the case for hard-X-ray beaming in NGC 6946 X-1
topic High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2408.07751