ALBERT

Description: X-ray reverberation, where light-travel time delays map out the compact geometry around the inner accretion flow in supermassive black holes, has been discovered in several of the brightest, most variable and well-known Seyfert galaxies. In this work, we expand the study of X-ray reverberation to all Seyfert galaxies in the XMM–Newton archive above a nominal rms variability and exposure level (a total of 43 sources). Approximately 50 per cent of sources exhibit iron K reverberation, in that the broad iron K emission line responds to rapid variability in the continuum. We also find that on long time-scales, the hard band emission lags behind the soft band emission in 85 per cent of sources. This ‘low-frequency hard lag’ is likely associated with the coronal emission, and so this result suggests that most sources with X-ray variability show intrinsic variability from the nuclear region. We update the known iron K lag amplitude versus black hole mass relation, and find evidence that the height or extent of the coronal source (as inferred by the reverberation time delay) increases with mass accretion rate.

Description: The quiescent spectrum of neutron star low-mass X-ray binaries typically consists of two components – a thermal component associated with emission from the neutron star surface, and a non-thermal power-law component whose origin is not well understood. Spectral fitting of neutron star atmosphere models to the thermal component is one of the leading methods for measuring the neutron star radius. However, it has been known for years that the X-ray spectra of quiescent neutron stars vary between observations. While most quiescent variability is explained through a variable power-law component, the brightest and best-studied object, Cen X-4, requires a change in the thermal component and such thermal variability could be a problem for measuring neutron star radii. In this paper, we significantly increase the number of sources whose quiescent spectra have been studied for variability. We examine nine potential quiescent neutron stars with luminosities ≤10 34  erg s –1 over the course of multiple Chandra observations of the globular clusters NGC 6440 and Terzan 5 and find no strong evidence for variability in the effective temperature in seven of the nine sources. Two sources show a potential change in temperature, though this depends on the exact model fitted. CX1 in NGC 6440 is equally well fitted by a variable thermal component or a variable power law. Therefore, the results are inconclusive and we cannot exclude or require thermal variability in that source. CX5 in NGC 6440 shows a potential change in temperature, though this depends on whether a power law is included in the spectral fit or not. This suggests that thermal variability may not be widespread among quiescent neutron stars with luminosities ≤10 34  erg s –1 , and hence thermal radiation remains a promising means to constraining neutron star radii.

Description: Models of X-ray reverberation from extended coronae are developed from general relativistic ray tracing simulations. Reverberation lags between correlated variability in the directly observed continuum emission and that reflected from the accretion disc arise due to the additional light travel time between the corona and reflecting disc. X-ray reverberation is detected from an increasing sample of Seyfert galaxies and a number of common properties are observed, including a transition from the characteristic reverberation signature at high frequencies to a hard lag within the continuum component at low frequencies, as well as a pronounced dip in the reverberation lag at 3 keV. These features are not trivially explained by the reverberation of X-rays originating from simple point sources. We therefore model reverberation from coronae extended both over the surface of the disc and vertically. Causal propagation through its extent for both the simple case of constant velocity propagation and propagation linked to the viscous time-scale in the underlying accretion disc is included as well as stochastic variability arising due to turbulence locally on the disc. We find that the observed features of X-ray reverberation in Seyfert galaxies can be explained if the long time-scale variability is dominated by the viscous propagation of fluctuations through the corona. The corona extends radially at low height over the surface of the disc but with a bright central region in which fluctuations propagate up the black hole rotation axis driven by more rapid variability arising from the innermost regions of the accretion flow.

Description: We conducted the first long-term (75 d) X-ray monitoring of the black hole low-mass X-ray binary V404 Cyg, with the goal of understanding and characterizing its variability during quiescence. The X-ray light curve of V404 Cyg shows several flares on time-scales of hours with a count rate change of a factor of about 5–8. The root-mean-square variability is F var  = 57.0 ± 3.2 per cent. The first-order structure function is consistent with both a power spectrum of index –1 (flicker noise), or with a power spectrum of index 0 (white noise), implying that the light curve is variable on time-scales from days to months. The X-ray spectrum is well fitted by a power law with spectral index  = 2.10–2.35, and we found that the spectral shape remains roughly constant as the flux changes. A constant spectral shape with respect to a change in the X-ray flux may favour a scenario in which the X-ray emission is dominated by synchrotron radiation produced in a jet.

Description: We study the X-ray properties of a sample of 14 optically selected low-mass active galactic nuclei (AGN) whose masses lie within the range 10 5 –2 10 6 M with XMM–Newton . Only six of these low-mass AGN have previously been studied with sufficient quality X-ray data, thus, we have more than double the number of low-mass AGN observed by XMM–Newton with the addition of our sample. We analyse their X-ray spectral properties and variability and compare the results to their more massive counterparts. The presence of a soft X-ray excess is detectable in all five objects which were not background dominated at 2–3 keV. Combined with previous studies, this gives a total of eight low-mass AGN with a soft excess. The low-mass AGN exhibit rapid, short-term variability (hundreds to thousands of seconds) and long-term variability (months to years). There is a well-known anticorrelation between black hole mass and variability amplitude (normalized excess variance). Comparing our sample of low-mass AGN with this relation we find that all of our sample lie below an extrapolation of the linear relation. Such a flattening of the relation at low masses (below ~10 6  M ) is expected if the variability in all AGN follows the same shape power spectrum with a break frequency that is dependent on mass. Finally, we also found two objects that show significant absorption in their X-ray spectrum, indicative of type 2 objects, although they are classified as type 1 AGN based on optical spectra.

Description: The quiescent state is the dominant accretion mode for black holes on all mass scales. Our knowledge of the X-ray spectrum is limited due to the characteristic low luminosity in this state. Herein, we present an analysis of the sample of dynamically confirmed stellar-mass black holes observed in quiescence in the Chandra/XMM–Newton/Suzaku era resulting in a sample of eight black holes with ~570 ks of observations. In contrast to the majority of active galactic nuclei where observations are limited by contamination from diffuse gas, the stellar-mass systems allow for a clean study of the X-ray spectrum resulting from the accretion flow alone. The data are characterized using simple models. We find a model consisting of a power law or thermal bremsstrahlung to both provide excellent descriptions of the data, where we measure  = 2.06 ± 0.03 and $kT = 5.03^{+0.33}_{-0.31}\,\mathrm{keV}$ , respectively, in the 0.3–10 keV bandpass, at a median luminosity of L x  ~ 5.5 10 –7 L Edd . This result in discussed in the context of our understanding of the accretion flow on to stellar and supermassive black holes at low luminosities.

Description: The recent detection of X-ray reverberation lags, especially in the Fe Kα line region, around active galactic nuclei (AGN) has opened up the possibility of studying the time-resolved response (reflection) of hard X-rays from the accretion disc around supermassive black holes. Here, we use general relativistic transfer functions for reflection of X-rays from a point source located at some height above the black hole to study the time lags expected as a function of frequency and energy in the Fe Kα line region. We explore the models and the dependence of the lags on key parameters such as the height of the X-ray source, accretion disc inclination, black hole spin and black hole mass. We then compare these models with the observed frequency- and energy-dependence of the Fe Kα line lag in NGC 4151. Assuming the optical reverberation mapping mass of 4.6 10 7 M , we get a best fit to the lag profile across the Fe Kα line in the frequency range (1-2) x 10 – 5  Hz for an X-ray source located at a height $h = 7^{+2.9}_{-2.6} R_G$ with a maximally spinning black hole and an inclination i 〈 30°.

Description: High-frequency iron K reverberation lags, where the red wing of the line responds before the line centroid, are a robust signature of relativistic reflection off the inner accretion disc. In this Letter, we report the discovery of the Fe K lag in PG 1244+026 from ~120 ks of data (one orbit of the XMM–Newton telescope). The amplitude of the lag with respect to the continuum is 1000 s at a frequency of ~10 –4  Hz. We also find a possible frequency dependence of the line: as we probe higher frequencies (i.e. shorter time-scales from a smaller emitting region) the Fe K lag peaks at the red wing of the line, while at lower frequencies (from a larger emitting region) we see the dominant reflection lag from the rest-frame line centroid. The mean energy spectrum shows a strong soft excess, though interestingly, there is no indication of a soft lag. Given that this source has radio emission and it has little reported correlated variability between the soft excess and the hard band, we explore one possible explanation in which the soft excess in this source is dominated by the steep power-law-like emission from a jet, and that a corona (or base of the jet) irradiates the inner accretion disc, creating the blurred reflection features evident in the spectrum and the lag. General relativistic ray-tracing models fit the Fe K lag well, with the best fit giving a compact X-ray source at a height of 5 r g and a black hole mass of 1.3 10 7 M .

Description: MCG-6-30-15 is one of the most observed narrow-line Seyfert 1 galaxies in the X-ray band. In this paper, we examine the X-ray time lags in this source using a total of 600 ks in observations (440 ks exposure) taken with the XMM–Newton telescope (300 ks in 2001 and 300 ks in 2013). Both the old and new observations show the usual hard lag that increases with energy; however, the hard lag turns over to a soft lag at frequencies below ~10 –4  Hz. The highest frequencies (~10 –3  Hz) in this source show a clear soft lag, as previously presented for the first 300 ks observation, but no clear iron K lag is detected in either the old or new observation. The soft lag is more significant in the old observation than the new. The observations are consistent with a reverberation interpretation, where the soft, reflected emission is delayed with respect to the hard power-law component. These spectral timing results suggest that two distinct variability mechanisms are important in this source: intrinsic coronal variations (which lead to correlated variability in the reprocessed emission) and geometrical changes in the corona. Variability due to geometrical changes does not result in correlated variability in the reflection, and therefore inhibits the clear detection of an iron K lag.

Description: Quiescent emission from the neutron star low-mass X-ray binary Cen X-4 is seen to be variable on time-scales from hundreds of seconds to years, suggesting that at least in this object, low-level accretion is important during quiescence. Here, we present results from recent XMM–Newton and Swift observations of Cen X-4, where the X-ray flux (0.5–10 keV) varies by a factor of 6.5 between the brightest and faintest states. We find a positive correlation between the X-ray flux and the simultaneous near-ultraviolet (UV) flux, where as there is no significant correlation between the X-ray and simultaneous optical ( V , B ) fluxes. This suggests that while the X-ray and UV emitting regions are somehow linked, the optical region originates elsewhere. Comparing the luminosities, it is plausible that the UV emission originates due to reprocessing of the X-ray flux by the accretion disc, with the hot inner region of the disc being a possible location for the UV emitting region. The optical emission, however, could be dominated by the donor star. The X-ray/UV correlation does not favour the accretion stream impact point as the source of the UV emission.