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We report the discovery of the new accreting millisecond X-ray pulsar SRGA J144459.2−604207 using data of the SRG/ART-XC. The source was observed twice in February 2024 during the declining phase of the outburst. The timing analysis revealed a coherent signal near 447.9 Hz modulated by the Doppler effect due to the orbital motion. The derived parameters for the binary system are consistent with a circular orbit with a period of ∼5.2 h. The pulse profiles of the persistent emission, showing a sine-like part during half a period with a plateau in between, can be well modeled by emission from two circular spots that are partially eclipsed by the accretion disk. Additionally, during our observations with an exposure of 133 ks, we detected 19 thermonuclear X-ray bursts. All bursts have similar shapes and energetics, and none show any signs of an expanding photospheric radius. The burst recurrence times decreases linearly from ∼1.6 h at the beginning of observations to ∼2.2 h at the end and anticorrelate with the persistent flux. The spectral evolution during the bursts is consistent with the models of the neutron star atmospheres that are heated by accretion and implies a neutron star radius of 11–12 km and a distance to the source of 8–9 kpc. We also detected coherent pulsations during the bursts and showed that the pulse profiles differ substantially from those observed in the persistent emission. However, we could not find a simple physical model explaining the pulse profiles detected during the bursts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We report on Imaging X-ray polarimetry explorer (IXPE) observations of the Be-transient X-ray pulsar LS V +44 17/RX J0440.9+4431 made at two luminosity levels during the giant outburst in January–February 2023. Considering the observed spectral variability and changes in the pulse profiles, the source was likely caught in supercritical and subcritical states with significantly different emission-region geometry, associated with the presence of accretion columns and hot spots, respectively. We focus here on the pulse-phase-resolved polarimetric analysis and find that the observed dependencies of the polarization degree and polarization angle (PA) on the pulse phase are indeed drastically different for the two observations. The observed differences, if interpreted within the framework of the rotating vector model (RVM), imply dramatic variations in the spin axis inclination, the position angle, and the magnetic colatitude by tens of degrees within the space of just a few days. We suggest that the apparent changes in the observed PA phase dependence are predominantly related to the presence of an unpulsed polarized component in addition to the polarized radiation associated with the pulsar itself. We then show that the observed PA phase dependence in both observations can be explained with a single set of RVM parameters defining the pulsar's geometry. We also suggest that the additional polarized component is likely produced by scattering of the pulsar radiation in the equatorial disk wind. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We report results of the first detailed spectral and temporal studies of the recently discovered Be/X-ray binary eRASSU J050810.4−660653 in Large Magellanic Cloud based on the data from the SRG /ART-XC, NuSTAR and Swift /XRT instruments obtained in 2021 December–2022 May in a wide energy range of 0.5–79 keV. Pulsations with the period of 40.5781 ± 0.0004 s were found in the source light curve with the pulsed fraction monotonically increasing with the energy. An estimate of the orbital period of ∼38 d was obtained based on the long-term monitoring of the system. The source spectrum can be well approximated with a power-law model modified by an exponential cutoff at high energies. The pulse phase-resolved spectroscopy shows a strong variation of spectral parameters depending on the phase of a neutron star rotation. We have not found any features connected with the cyclotron absorption line both in the phase-averaged and phase-resolved spectra of eRASSU J050810.4−660653. However, the neutron star magnetic field was estimated around several 1013 G using different indirect methods. Discovered variations of the hardness ratio over the pulse phase is discussed in terms of physical and geometrical properties of the emitting region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work, the temporal and spectral properties of the poorly studied X-ray pulsar Swift J1808.4−1754 were investigated in the 0.8–79 keV energy range based on the data from the NuSTAR and Swift observatories collected during the 2014 outburst. Strong pulsations with a period of 909.73 ± 0.03 s were detected in the source light curve, with the pulsed fraction demonstrating a non-monotonic dependence on the energy with a local minimum around 17–22 keV. Phase lags in one of the pulse profile components, reaching the maximal value approximately at the same energy, were discovered. The pulse phase-averaged spectrum of the source has a power-law shape with an exponential cutoff at high energies, which is typical of X-ray pulsars. Pulse phase-resolved spectroscopy revealed the presence of a pulse-phase-transient cyclotron absorption line at ∼21 keV, allowing us to estimate the neutron star magnetic field of 2.4 × 1012 G. This makes Swift J1808.4−1754 a member of very small family of X-ray pulsars with a pulse-phase-transient cyclotron line in a narrow phase range. The data from the Nordic Optical Telescope allowed us to study the properties of the infrared companion in the system and to conclude that most probably it is a Be-type star located at a distance of 5–8 kpc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We report results of the spectral and timing analysis of the Be/X-ray pulsar SXP 4.78 using the data obtained during its recent outburst with NuSTAR, Swift, Chandra , and NICER observatories. Using an overall evolution of the system luminosity, spectral analysis, and variability power spectrum we obtain constraints on the neutron star magnetic field strength. We found a rapid evolution of the variability power spectrum during the rise of the outburst, and absence of the significant changes during the flux decay. Several low frequency quasi-periodic oscillation features are found to emerge on the different stages of the outburst, but no clear clues on their origin were found in the energy spectrum and overall flux behaviour. We use several indirect methods to estimate the magnetic field strength on the neutron star surface and found that most of them suggest magnetic field B ≲ 2 × 1012 G. The strictest upper limit comes from the absence of the cyclotron absorption features in the energy spectra and suggests relatively weak magnetic field B < 6 × 1011 G.) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We report on NuSTAR observations of the well-known wind-accreting X-ray pulsar GX 301–2 during a strong spin-up episode that took place in January–March 2019. A measurement of high luminosity of the source in the most recent observation allowed us to detect a positive correlation of the cyclotron line energy with luminosity. Beyond that, only minor differences in spectral and temporal properties of the source during the spin-up, presumably associated with the formation of a transient accretion disk, and the normal wind-fed state could be detected. Finally, we discuss conditions for the formation of the disk and possible reasons for lack of any appreciable variations in most of the observed source properties induced by the change of the accretion mechanism, and conclude that the bulk of the observed X-ray emission is still likely powered by direct accretion from the wind. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ultracompact low-mass X-ray binary 4U1820-30 situated in the globular cluster NGC6624 has an orbital period of only ≈11.4min, which likely implies a white dwarf companion. The observed X-ray bursts demonstrate a photospheric radius expansion phase and therefore are believed to reach the Eddington luminosity, allowing us to estimate the mass and the radius of the neutron star (NS) in this binary. Here, we re-analyse all Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer observations of the system and confirm that almost all the bursts took place during the hard persistent state of the system. This allows us to use the recently developed direct cooling tail method to estimate the NS mass and radius. However, because of the very short, about a second, duration of the cooling tail phases that can be described by the theoretical atmosphere models, the obtained constraints on the NS radius are not very strict. Assuming a pure helium NS atmosphere, we found that the NS radius is in the range 10-12 km, if the NS mass is below 1.7M☉, and in a wider range of 8-12 km for a higher 1.7-2.0M☉ NS mass. The method also constrains the distance to the system to be 6.5 ± 0.5 kpc, which is consistent with the distance to the cluster. For the solar composition atmosphere, the NS parameters are in strong contradiction with the generally accepted range of possible NS masses and radii. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We report the results of a spectral and timing analysis of the poorly studied transient X-ray pulsar 2S 1553-542 using data collected with the NuSTAR and Chandra observatories and the Fermi/GBMinstrument during an outburst in 2015. The properties of the source at high energies (>30 keV) are studied for the first time and the sky position has been essentially improved. The source broad-band spectrum has a quite complicated shape and can be reasonably described by a composite model with two continuum components - a blackbody emission with the temperature about 1 keV at low energies and a power law with an exponential cut-off at high energies. Additionally, an absorption feature at ∼23.5 keV is discovered both in phaseaveraged and phase-resolved spectra and interpreted as the cyclotron resonance scattering feature corresponding to the magnetic field strength of the neutron star B ∼ 3 × 1012 G. Based on the Fermi/GBM data, the orbital parameters of the system were substantially improved, which allowed us to determine the spin period of the neutron star P = 9.27880(3) s and a local spin-up P ≃ -7.5 × 10-10 s s-1 due to the mass accretion during the NuSTAR observations. Assuming accretion from the disc and using standard torque models, we estimated the distance to the system as d = 20 ± 4 kpc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We report results of our search for fast oscillations in light curve of one of the brightest accretion powered pulsars on the sky V0332+53 with the help of data of the PCA spectrometer of the RXTE (Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer) observatory. In course of this search we have carefully explored complications appearing if one uses only sub-bands of the total bandpass of the PCA spectrometer. We show that light curves collected in the soft sub-band of the PCA spectrometer contains an additional instrumental noise, light curves of harder sub-bands lack some fraction of the anticipated Poisson noise. We show that this noise is caused by a cross-talk of energy bands, which lasts up to ~200 µs. One hypothesis is that these effects are caused by temporarily drop of the PCA detector gain after any occurred event due to slowly moving ions in the detector volume. In order to avoid this effect we searched for fast oscillations in flux of V0332+53 only in the total bandpass of the PCA spectrometer 2-60 keV.We have not detected any quasi-periodic oscillations in light curve of the source with an upper limit at the level of 0.5 per cent in the Fourier frequency range 200-1500 Hz. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT We present the results of deep scans across the Galactic plane that were performed with RXTE/PCA in 2010-2011. We studied the stripe from bII = 0° to bII = −30° at lII ≈ 18.°5. We show that the variance of the cosmic X-ray background (CXB) at angular scales ∼1 deg2 is approximately 5 per cent, which is compatible with the variance expected from Poisson variations of a number of discrete sources within the considered field of view. We estimate the cumulative fractional emissivity of the Galactic ridge X-ray emission (GRXE) as (3.0 ± 0.3) × 1027 erg s−1 M [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A black hole x-ray binary (XRB) system forms when gas is stripped from a normal star and accretes onto a black hole, which heats the gas sufficiently to emit x-rays. We report a polarimetric observation of the XRB Cygnus X-1 using the Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer. The electric field position angle aligns with the outflowing jet, indicating that the jet is launched from the inner x-ray-emitting region. The polarization degree is 4.01 ± 0.20% at 2 to 8 kiloelectronvolts, implying that the accretion disk is viewed closer to edge-on than the binary orbit. These observations reveal that hot x-ray-emitting plasma is spatially extended in a plane perpendicular to, not parallel to, the jet axis.