X-ray observations of neutron stars with XMM-Newton & Chandra [Elektronische Ressource] / vorgelegt von Hui Chung Yue

Chung-Yue Hui

Sujets

• Astronomie

Informations

• Publié par: ludwig-maximilians-universitat_munchen
• Publié le: 01 janvier 2007
• Nombre de lectures: 28
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 4 Mo

Extrait

X-Ray Observations of Neutron Stars
with XMM-Newton & Chandra
Hui Chung Yue
Munchen¨ 2007X-Ray Observations of Neutron Stars
with XMM-Newton & Chandra
Hui Chung Yue
Dissertation
an der Fakult¨at fur¨ Physik
der Ludwig–Maximilians–Universit¨at
Munc¨ hen
vorgelegt von
Hui Chung Yue
aus Hong Kong
Munc¨ hen, den 6 November 2007Erstgutachter: Priv. Doz. Dr. Werner Becker
Zweitgutachter: Prof. Dr. Harald Lesch
Tag der mundlic¨ hen Prufung:¨ 27 November 2007Contents
Summary xiii
1 Introduction 1
1.1 A Brief History of Neutron Stars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.2 The Physics of Neutron Stars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
1.2.1 Formation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
1.2.2 Global structure. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
1.2.3 Composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
1.2.4 Thermal evolution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
1.2.5 Pulsar magnetosphere and high energy radiation . . . . . . . . . . . 11
1.3 Manifestations of Isolated Neutron Stars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
1.3.1 Rotation-powered pulsars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
1.3.2 Soft γ−ray repeaters/Anomalous X-ray pulsars . . . . . . . . . . . 19
1.3.3 Central compact objects in supernova remnants . . . . . . . . . . . 20
1.3.4 Dim thermal isolated neutron stars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
1.3.5 Rotating RAdio Transients (RRATs) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
1.4 Studying Neutron Stars with XMM-Newton & Chandra . . . . . . . . . . . 22
1.4.1 Chandra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
1.4.2 XMM-Newton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
2 X-ray observations of RX J0822-4300 and Puppis-A 25
2.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
2.2 Observations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
2.2.1 XMM-Newton Observations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
2.2.2 Chandra Observations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
2.3 Data Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
2.3.1 Spatial Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
2.3.2 Spectral . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
2.3.3 Timing Analysis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
2.4 Discussion & Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35vi CONTENTS
3 Probing the Proper Motion of the Compact Object in Puppis-A 51
3.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
3.2 Observation and data analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
3.3 Results and Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
4 XMM-Newton Observations of the Compact Object in RX J0852.0-4622 59
4.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
4.2 Observations & Data Reduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
4.3 Data Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
4.3.1 Spatial Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
4.3.2 Spectral . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
4.3.3 Timing Analysis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
4.4 Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
5 Radio and X-ray Nebulae associated with PSR J1509-5850 75
5.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
5.2 Observations and data analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
5.3 Discussion & Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
6 Discovery of an X-ray Nebula associated with PSR J2124-3358 87
6.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
6.2 Observations and data analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
6.3 Discussion & Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
7 X-ray emission properties of the old pulsar PSR B2224+65 97
7.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
7.2 Observations and data analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
7.3 Discussion & Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
8 Chandra observation of the old pulsar PSR B1929+10 113
8.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
8.2 Observations and data analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
8.2.1 Spatial analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
8.2.2 Spectral . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
8.3 Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
9 Searches for X-ray counterparts of millisecond pulsars in M28 127
9.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
9.2 Observations and Data Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128
9.3 Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130CONTENTS vii
10 Conclusions & Discussions 135
10.1 The nature of central compact objects in supernova remnants . . . . . . . 135
10.2 Emission mechanism of non-recycled old pulsars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
10.3 High energy emission of pulsar wind nebulae . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138
10.4 Millisecond pulsars in globular clusters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
10.5 Future prospects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
Bibliography 147
Acknowledgments 155
Curriculum Vitae 156viii CONTENTSList of Figures
1.1 Illustration of the structure of the neutron star interior . . . . . . . . . . . 7
1.2 of the pulsar magnetosphere . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
2.1 MOS1/2 false color X-ray image of the central region of Puppis−A. . . . . 39
2.2 RASS false color image of Puppis−A and parts of the Vela SNR . . . . . . 40
0 02.3 XMM PN False color image of the 4.4 ×4.4 region around RX J0822-4300 41
2.4 Chandra HRC-I brightness profile for RX J0822-4300 . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
2.5 X-ray images of Puppis−A with radio contour lines . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
2.6 Energy spectrum of RX J0822-4300 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
2.7 Components of the model fitted to the spectral data of RX J0822−4300 . . 46
2.8 Error contours for the best-fit model to the spectrum of RX J0822−4300 . 47
2.9 Energy spectrum of the rim emission underneath RX J0822−4300 . . . . . 48
22.10 Pulse profiles of RX J0822−4300 and the Z -distribution . . . . . . . . . . 501
3.1 Part of the HRC-I image of Puppis−A as observed in April 2005 . . . . . . 57
3.2 The best-fit positions of RX J0822−4300 in two HRC-I observations . . . . 58
4.1 RASS image of Puppis−A and RX J0852.0-4622 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
4.2 MOS1/2 false color image of RX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
4.3 Energy spectrum of CXOU J085201.4-461753 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
4.4 Error contours for the best-fitted spectral model for CXOU J085201.4-461753 72
5.1 ACIS image of the field around PSR J1509−5850 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
5.2 Energy spectrum of the X-ray trail of PSR J1509−5850 . . . . . . . . . . . 83
5.3 Radio image of the field around PSR J1509−5850 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
5.4 X-ray of PSR J1509−5850 with radio contour lines . . . . . . . . . . 85
6.1 MOS1/2 and ACIS images of PSR J2124−3358 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
6.2 Energy spectrum of the X-ray trail of PSR J2124−3358 . . . . . . . . . . . 94
7.1 ACIS image of the field around PSR B2224+65 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104
7.2 Brightness profile of the extend feature associated with PSR B2224+65 . . 105
7.3 Energy spectrum of PSR B2224+65 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
7.4 Temperature upper limits of the polar cap of PSR B2224+65 . . . . . . . . 108x LIST OF FIGURES
7.5 Energy spectrum of the extended feature associated with PSR B2224+65 . 109
7.6 Variation of f(r ,α) with the magnetic inclination angle . . . . . . . . . . 111in
8.1 ACIS images of the field around PSR B1929+10 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
8.2 Radial profile of PSR B1929+10 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
8.3 Comparison between Chandra and XMM images . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
8.4 Energy spectra of PSR B1929+10 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
8.5 Error contours for the best-fit model to the spectra of PSR B1929+10 . . 125
8.6 Energy spectra of the arc-like structure associated PSR . . . . 126
9.1 ACIS-S3 image of the central region of M28 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132
10.1 ROSAT PSPC image of G67.7+1.8 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144
10.2 ACIS-I false color image of . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145