Related papers: Soft X-ray Polarization in Thermal Magnetar Emissi…
As is known, resonant scattering can distort the surface-brightness profiles of clusters of galaxies in X-ray lines. We demonstrate that the scattered line emission should be polarized and possibly detectable with near-future X-ray…
X-ray emission is a common feature of all varieties of isolated neutron stars (INS) and, thanks to the advent of sensitive instruments with good spectroscopic, timing, and imaging capabilities, X-ray observations have become an essential…
We present a theoretical study of radiative transfer in strongly magnetized electron-ion plasmas, focusing on the effect of vacuum polarization due to quantum electrodynamics. This study is directly relevant to thermal radiation from the…
Imaging of nanoscale magnetic textures within extended material systems is of critical importance both to fundamental research and technological applications. Whilst high resolution magnetic imaging of thin nanoscale samples is…
Polarimetric measurements, especially if extended at high energy, are expected to provide important insights into the mechanisms underlying the acceleration of relativistic particles in jets. In a previous work we have shown that the…
The polarization of X-ray emission is a unique tool used to investigate the magnetic field structure around astrophysical objects. In this paper, we study the linear polarization of X-ray emissions from gamma-ray binary systems based on…
Most models of anomalous X-ray pulsars (AXPs) account for the observed X-ray spectra and pulsations by means of radiation processes that occur on the surfaces of neutron stars. For any such model, general relativistic deflection of light…
The surface temperatures as well as X-ray luminosities of Anomalous X-ray Pulsars and Soft Gamma Repeaters are several times higher than that of the ordinary isolated neutron stars at similar ages. We present a simple approach to explain…
We present a model of thermal X-ray emission from hot spots on the surface of a rotating compact star with an unmagnetized light-element atmosphere. An application to ROSAT, Chandra, and XMM-Newton X-ray observations of the nearest known…
This paper considers the problem of modeling the light polarization that emerges from an astrophysical plasma composed of atoms whose excitation state is significantly influenced by the anisotropy of the incident radiation field. In…
We study the thermal structure and evolution of magnetars as cooling neutron stars with a phenomenological heat source in an internal layer. We focus on the effect of magnetized (B > 10^{14} G) non-accreted and accreted outermost envelopes…
We present a study of the X-ray properties of a sample of six nearby late-type spiral galaxies based on XMM-Newton observations. Since our primary focus is on the linkage between X-ray emission and star formation in extended, extranuclear…
This paper presents a new analysis of the thermal emission from the neutron star surface to constrain the dense matter equation of state. It is based on the use of a Markov-Chain Monte Carlo algorithm combined with an empirical…
Persistent activity of magnetars is associated with electric discharge that continually injects relativistic particles into the magnetosphere. Large active magnetic loops around magnetars must be filled with outflowing particles that…
Time-resolved optical and infrared polarimetric observations of black hole and neutron star low-mass X-ray binaries are presented. Data were acquired with the VLT, UKIRT and HIPPO on the SAAO 1.9-m. We find that for some sources in…
Thermal emission from the accretion disc around a black hole can be polarized, due to Thomson scattering in a disc atmosphere. In Newtonian space, the polarization angle must be either parallel or perpendicular to the projection of the disc…
Magnetars are the most magnetized objects in the known universe. Powered by the magnetic energy, and not by the rotational energy as in the case of radio pulsars, they have long been regarded as a completely different class of neutron…
The study of polarized radiation transfer in the highly-magnetized surface locales of neutron stars is of great interest to the understanding of accreting X-ray pulsars, rotation-powered pulsars and magnetars. This paper explores scattering…
In this chapter we give an overview of the properties of X-ray binary systems containing a weakly magnetized neutron star. These are old (Giga-years life-time) semi-detached binary systems containing a neutron star with a relatively weak…
Decades of astrophysical observations have convincingly shown that soft X-ray (SXR; ~0.1--10 keV) emission provides unique diagnostics for the high temperature plasmas observed in solar flares and active regions. SXR observations critical…