Related papers: EXIST perspective for Supergiant Fast X-ray Transi…

We describe our monitoring strategy which best exploits the sensitivity and flexibility of Swift to study the long-term behaviour of Supergiant Fast X-ray Transients (SFXTs). We present observations of the recent outbursts from two objects…

Supergiant Fast X-ray transients are a subclass of high mass X-ray binaries displaying a peculiar and still poorly understood extreme variability in the X-ray domain. These sources undergo short sporadic outbursts (LX ~ 10^36 - 10^37…

We report here on the recent results of a monitoring campaign we have been carrying out with Swift/XRT on a sample of four Supergiant Fast X-ray Transients. The main goal of this large programme (with a net Swift/XRT exposure of 540 ks,…

SAX J1818.6-1703 is a flaring transient X-ray source serendipitously discovered by BeppoSAX in 1998 during an observation of the Galactic centre. The source was identified as a High-Mass X-ray Binary with an OB SuperGiant companion.…

IGR J11215-5952 is a hard X-ray transient source discovered in April 2005 with INTEGRAL and a confirmed member of the new class of High Mass X-ray Binaries, the Supergiant Fast X-ray Transients (SFXTs). Archival INTEGRAL data and RXTE…

We report on the discovery of two Fast X-ray Transients (FXTs) from analysis of archival INTEGRAL data. Both are characterized by a remarkable hard X-ray activity above 20 keV, in term of duration (about 15 and 30 minutes, respectively),…

A significant fraction of high-mass X-ray binaries are supergiant fast X-ray transients (SFXTs). The prime model for the physics governing their X-ray behaviour suggests that the winds of donor OB supergiants are magnetized. To investigate…

The recent hard X-ray surveys performed by INTEGRAL and Swift have started to reveal the demographics of compact sources including Super-Massive Black Holes hosted in AGNs and have proven invaluable in tracking explosive events as the death…

We present an overview of our Supergiant Fast X-ray Transients (SFXT) project, that started in 2007, by highlighting the unique observational contribution Swift is giving to this exciting new field. By means of outburst detection with…

One of the most recent discoveries of the INTEGRAL observatory is the existence of a previously unknown population of X-ray sources in the inner arms of the Galaxy. IGR J17544-2619, IGR J16465-4507 and XTE J1739-302 are among these sources.…

Supergiant fast X-ray transients are a new class of high mass X-ray binaries recently discovered with INTEGRAL. Hours long outbursts from these sources have been observed on numerous occasions at luminosities of ~1E36-1E37 erg/s, whereas…

Supergiant fast X-ray transients (SFXTs) are characterized by a remarkable variability in the X-ray domain, widely ascribed to the accretion from a clumpy stellar wind. In this paper we performed a systematic and homogeneous analysis of…

We report on Suzaku observations of four unidentified sources from the INTEGRAL and Swift BAT Galactic plane surveys. All the sources have a large neutral hydrogen column density and are likely members of an emerging class of heavily…

I present a brief up-to-date review of the current understanding of Supergiant Fast X-ray Transients, with an emphasis on the observational point of view. After more than a decade since their discovery, a remarkable progress has been made…

INTEGRAL monitoring of the Galactic Plane is revealing a growing number of recurrent X-ray transients, characterised by short outbursts with very fast rise times (~ tens of minutes) and typical durations of a few hours. A substantial…

Since its launch, the X-ray and gamma-ray observatory INTEGRAL satellite has revealed a new class of high-mass X-ray binaries (HMXB) displaying fast flares and hosting supergiant companion stars. Optical and infrared (OIR) observations in a…

We report on the Swift monitoring of the candidate supergiant fast X-ray transient (SFXT) IGR J16418-4532, for which both orbital and spin periods are known (~3.7d and ~1250s, respectively). Our observations, for a total of ~43ks, span over…

A new type of high-energy binary system has been revealed by the INTEGRAL satellite. These sources are being unveiled by means of multi-wavelength optical, near- and mid-infrared observations. Among these sources, two distinct classes are…

We performed a search for fast X-ray transients (FXTs), with durations longer than one second and less than one day, through data of the Wide Field Camera (WFC) instrument onboard the BeppoSAX X-ray observatory collected between June 1996…

We present the most recent results from our investigation on Supergiant Fast X-ray Transients, a class of High-Mass X-ray Binaries, with a possible counterpart in the gamma-ray energy band. Since 2007 Swift has contributed to this new field…