Related papers: On Neutral Absorption and Spectral Evolution in X-…
The INTEGRAL satellite has revealed a major population of supergiant High Mass X-ray Binaries in our Galaxy, revolutionizing our understanding of binary systems and their evolution. This population, constituted of a compact object orbiting…
From hot, tenuous gas dominated by Compton processes, to warm, photoionized emission-line regions, to cold, optically thick fluorescing matter, accreting gas flows in X-ray binaries span a huge portion of the parameter space accessible to…
Today's sensitive, high-resolution X-ray observations allow the study of populations of X-ray sources, in the luminosity range of Galactic X-ray binaries, in galaxies as distant as 20-30 Mpc. The traditional astronomical tools of…
Chandra observations show the importance of the X-ray band for studying the evolution of galaxies. Binary X-ray sources are an easily detectable tracer of the stellar population. Chandra studies of these populations are giving us insights…
X-ray observations of the Galactic X-ray binaries (XRB) revealed numerous highly ionized metal absorption lines. However, it is unclear whether such lines are produced by the hot interstellar medium (ISM) or the circumstellar medium (CSM)…
We present initial results from observations of the low-mass X-ray binary EXO 0748-67 with the Reflection Grating Spectrometer on board the XMM-Newton Observatory. The spectra exhibit discrete structure due to absorption and emission from…
We have conducted an extensive X-ray spectral variability study of a sample of 20 Compton-thin type II galaxies using broad band spectra from XMM-Newton, Chandra, and Suzaku. The aim is to study the variability of the neutral intrinsic…
The European gamma-ray observatory INTEGRAL has found a group of hard X-ray sources which are highly absorbed, i.e., with column densities higher than about 10^{23}/cm^2. Here I give an overview of this class of INTEGRAL sources. The X-ray,…
Compact binaries have long been a paradigm for accretion theory. Much of our present view of how accretion occurs comes directly from the comparison of theory with observations of these sources. Since theory differs little for other objects…
We select a sample of nearby Ultraluminous X-ray sources with long XMM-Newton observations and analyse all the available XMM-Newton data using both X-ray spectral fitting techniques and hardness-intensity diagrams. The sample includes IC…
Using a sample of two hundred luminous (L_unabs>10^38 erg/s, where L_unabs is the unabsorbed 0.25-8 keV luminosity) high-mass X-ray binary (HMXB) candidates found with Chandra in 27 nearby galaxies, we have constructed the collective X-ray…
X-ray binaries play a significant role in the thermal and ionization history of galaxies. Their X-ray luminosity can shed light on galactic star formation rates and histories. Compact objects are also crucial in the evolution of…
In this paper we survey the theory of wind accretion in high mass X-ray binaries hosting a magnetic neutron star and a supergiant companion. We concentrate on the different types of interaction between the inflowing wind matter and the…
Theoretical and observational support suggests that the spectral evolution of neutron-star LMXBs, including transient hard X-ray tails, may be explained by the interplay between thermal and bulk motion Comptonization. In this framework, we…
Because of its complex clumpy wind, prominent cyclotron resonant scattering features, intrinsic variability and convenient physical parameters (close distance, high inclination, small orbital separation) which facilitate the observation and…
We review some of the main physical and statistical properties of the X-ray absorber in AGNs. In particular, we review the distribution of the absorbing column density inferred from X-ray observations of various AGN samples. We discuss the…
We present a detailed study of X-ray absorption in the local interstellar medium by analyzing the X-ray spectra of 24 galactic sources obtained with the {\it Chandra} High Energy Transmission Grating Spectrometer and the {\it XMM-Newton}…
We model the X-rays reprocessed by an accretion disk in a fiducial low-mass X-ray binary system with a neutron star primary. An atmosphere, or the intermediate region between the optically thick disk and a Compton-temperature corona, is…
The X-ray column density (NHX) of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) can probe the local environment of their progenitors over a wide redshift range. Previous work has suggested an increasing trend as a function of redshift. The relevance of the…
The application of standard accretion theory to observations of X-ray binaries provides valuable insights into neutron star properties, such as their spin period and magnetic field. However, most studies concentrate on relatively old…