X-ray outbursts of ESO 243-49 HLX-1: Comparison with galactic low-mass X-ray binary transients
We studied the outburst properties of the hyper-luminous X-ray source ESO 243-49 HLX-1, using the full set of Swift monitoring observations. We quantified the increase in the waiting time, recurrence time, and e-folding rise timescale along the outburst sequence, and the corresponding decrease in ou...
| Main Authors: | , , , , |
|---|---|
| Format: | Journal Article |
| Published: |
2015
|
| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/4057 |
| _version_ | 1848744407499538432 |
|---|---|
| author | Yan, Z. Zhang, W. Soria, Roberto Altamirano, D. Yu, W. |
| author_facet | Yan, Z. Zhang, W. Soria, Roberto Altamirano, D. Yu, W. |
| author_sort | Yan, Z. |
| building | Curtin Institutional Repository |
| collection | Online Access |
| description | We studied the outburst properties of the hyper-luminous X-ray source ESO 243-49 HLX-1, using the full set of Swift monitoring observations. We quantified the increase in the waiting time, recurrence time, and e-folding rise timescale along the outburst sequence, and the corresponding decrease in outburst duration, total radiated energy, and e-folding decay timescale, which confirms previous findings. HLX-1 spends less and less time in outburst and more and more time in quiescence, but its peak luminosity remains approximately constant. We compared the HLX-1 outburst properties with those of bright Galactic low-mass X-ray binary transients (LMXBTs). Our spectral analysis strengthens the similarity between state transitions in HLX-1 and those in Galactic LMXBTs. We also found that HLX-1 follows the nearly linear correlations between the hard-to-soft state transition luminosity and the peak luminosity, and between the rate of change of X-ray luminosity during the rise phase and the peak luminosity, which indicates that the occurrence of the hard-to-soft state transition of HLX-1 is similar to those of Galactic LMXBTs during outbursts. We found that HLX-1 does not follow the correlations between total radiated energy and peak luminosity, and between total radiated energy and e-folding rise/decay timescales we had previously identified in Galactic LMXBTs. HLX-1 would follow those correlations if the distance were several hundreds of kiloparsecs. However, invoking a much closer distance for HLX-1 is not a viable solution to this problem, as it introduces other, more serious inconsistencies with the observations. |
| first_indexed | 2025-11-14T06:00:58Z |
| format | Journal Article |
| id | curtin-20.500.11937-4057 |
| institution | Curtin University Malaysia |
| institution_category | Local University |
| last_indexed | 2025-11-14T06:00:58Z |
| publishDate | 2015 |
| recordtype | eprints |
| repository_type | Digital Repository |
| spelling | curtin-20.500.11937-40572019-02-19T05:34:47Z X-ray outbursts of ESO 243-49 HLX-1: Comparison with galactic low-mass X-ray binary transients Yan, Z. Zhang, W. Soria, Roberto Altamirano, D. Yu, W. We studied the outburst properties of the hyper-luminous X-ray source ESO 243-49 HLX-1, using the full set of Swift monitoring observations. We quantified the increase in the waiting time, recurrence time, and e-folding rise timescale along the outburst sequence, and the corresponding decrease in outburst duration, total radiated energy, and e-folding decay timescale, which confirms previous findings. HLX-1 spends less and less time in outburst and more and more time in quiescence, but its peak luminosity remains approximately constant. We compared the HLX-1 outburst properties with those of bright Galactic low-mass X-ray binary transients (LMXBTs). Our spectral analysis strengthens the similarity between state transitions in HLX-1 and those in Galactic LMXBTs. We also found that HLX-1 follows the nearly linear correlations between the hard-to-soft state transition luminosity and the peak luminosity, and between the rate of change of X-ray luminosity during the rise phase and the peak luminosity, which indicates that the occurrence of the hard-to-soft state transition of HLX-1 is similar to those of Galactic LMXBTs during outbursts. We found that HLX-1 does not follow the correlations between total radiated energy and peak luminosity, and between total radiated energy and e-folding rise/decay timescales we had previously identified in Galactic LMXBTs. HLX-1 would follow those correlations if the distance were several hundreds of kiloparsecs. However, invoking a much closer distance for HLX-1 is not a viable solution to this problem, as it introduces other, more serious inconsistencies with the observations. 2015 Journal Article http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/4057 10.1088/0004-637X/811/1/23 fulltext |
| spellingShingle | Yan, Z. Zhang, W. Soria, Roberto Altamirano, D. Yu, W. X-ray outbursts of ESO 243-49 HLX-1: Comparison with galactic low-mass X-ray binary transients |
| title | X-ray outbursts of ESO 243-49 HLX-1: Comparison with galactic low-mass X-ray binary transients |
| title_full | X-ray outbursts of ESO 243-49 HLX-1: Comparison with galactic low-mass X-ray binary transients |
| title_fullStr | X-ray outbursts of ESO 243-49 HLX-1: Comparison with galactic low-mass X-ray binary transients |
| title_full_unstemmed | X-ray outbursts of ESO 243-49 HLX-1: Comparison with galactic low-mass X-ray binary transients |
| title_short | X-ray outbursts of ESO 243-49 HLX-1: Comparison with galactic low-mass X-ray binary transients |
| title_sort | x-ray outbursts of eso 243-49 hlx-1: comparison with galactic low-mass x-ray binary transients |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/4057 |