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Dettagli Bibliografici
Autori principali: Zuo, Zihao, Cugno, Gabriele, Michail, Joseph, Gallo, Elena, Russell, David M., Plotkin, Richard M., Zou, Fan, Baglio, M. Cristina, Casella, Piergiorgio, Cowie, Fraser J., Fender, Rob, Gandhi, Poshak, Markoff, Sera, Vincentelli, Federico, Lewis, Fraser, Miller, Jon M., Miller-Jones, James C. A., Veledina, Alexandra
Natura: Preprint
Pubblicazione: 2025
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Accesso online:https://arxiv.org/abs/2505.23918
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Sommario:
  • We present new observations of the black hole X-ray binary A0620-00 using the Mid-Infrared Instrument on the James Webb Space Telescope, during a state where the X-ray luminosity is 9 orders of magnitude below Eddington, and coordinated with radio, near-infrared and optical observations. The goal is to understand the nature of the excess mid-infrared (MIR) emission originally detected by Spitzer red-ward of 8 $μ$m. The stellar-subtracted MIR spectrum is well-modeled by a power law with a spectral index of $α=0.72\pm0.01$, where the flux density scales with frequency as $F_ν\propto ν^α$. The spectral characteristics, along with rapid variability--a 40% flux flare at 15$μ$m and 25% achromatic variability in the 5-12 $μ$m range--rule out a circumbinary disk as the source of the MIR excess. The Low Resolution Spectrometer reveals a prominent emission feature at 7.5 $μ$m, resulting from the blend of three hydrogen recombination lines. While the contribution from partially self-absorbed synchrotron radiation cannot be ruled out, we argue that thermal bremsstrahlung from a warm (a few $10^4$ K) wind accounts for the MIR excess; the same outflow is responsible for the emission lines. The inferred mass outflow rate indicates that the system's low luminosity is due to a substantial fraction of the mass supplied by the donor star being expelled through a wind rather than accreted onto the black hole.