X-RAY AND RADIO VARIABILITY OF M31*, THE ANDROMEDA GALAXY NUCLEAR SUPERMASSIVE BLACK HOLE
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Garcia-2010-X-RAY AND RADIO VARI.pdf
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Author(s)
Garcia, M. R.
Hextall, Richard
Galache, Jose
Melia, Fulvio
Murray, Stephen S.
Primini, F. A.
Sjouwerman, Loránt O.
Williams, Ben
Baganoff, Frederick K
Date Issued
February 2010
Journal
Astrophysical Journal
Publisher
Institute of Physics/American Astronomical Society
Citation
Garcia, Michael R., Richard Hextall, Frederick K. Baganoff, Jose Galache, Fulvio Melia, Stephen S. Murray, F. A. Primini, Loránt O. Sjouwerman, and Ben Williams. “X-RAY AND RADIO VARIABILITY OF M31*, THE ANDROMEDA GALAXY NUCLEAR SUPERMASSIVE BLACK HOLE.” The Astrophysical Journal 710, no. 1 (January 21, 2010): 755–763. © 2009 American Astronomical Society.
Version
Final published version
Abstract
We confirm our earlier tentative detection of M31* in X-rays and measure its light curve and spectrum. Observations in 2004-2005 find M31* rather quiescent in the X-ray and radio. However, X-ray observations in 2006-2007 show M31* to be highly variable at times. A separate variable X-ray source is found near P1, the brighter of the two optical nuclei. The apparent angular Bondi radius of M31* is the largest of any black hole and large enough to be well resolved with Chandra. The diffuse emission within this Bondi radius is found to have an X-ray temperature ~0.3 keV and density 0.1 cm[superscript –3], indistinguishable from the hot gas in the surrounding regions of the bulge given the statistics allowed by the current observations. The X-ray source at the location of M31* is consistent with a point source and a power-law spectrum with energy slope 0.9 ± 0.2. Our identification of this X-ray source with M31* is based solely on positional coincidence.
MIT Department
MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research
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DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1088/0004-637x/710/1/755
