Related papers: A new type of X-ray pulsar
Observations with powerful X-ray telescopes, such as XMM-Newton and Chandra, significantly advance our understanding of massive stars. Nearly all early-type stars are X-ray sources. Studies of their X-ray emission provide important…
Most types of massive stars display X-ray emission that is affected by the properties of their stellar winds. Single non-magnetic OB stars have an X-ray luminosity that scales with their bolometric luminosity and their emission is thought…
Magnetically confined winds of early-type stars are expected to be sources of bright and hard X-rays. To clarify the systematics of the observed X-ray properties, we have analyzed a large series of Chandra and XMM observations,…
We investigate the connections between the magnetic fields and the X-ray emission from massive stars. Our study shows that the X-ray properties of known strongly magnetic stars are diverse: while some comply to the predictions of the…
A growing number of early Be stars discovered in X-ray surveys exhibit X-ray luminosities intermediate between those of normal stars and those of most Be/X-ray binaries in quiescence. Their X-ray spectra are also much harder than those of…
The X-ray properties of twenty ~1 Myr old O, B, and A stars of the Orion Trapezium are examined with data from the Chandra Orion Ultradeep Project (COUP). On the basis of simple theories for X-ray emission, we define two classes separated…
Young O stars are strong, hard, and variable X-ray sources, properties which strongly affect their circumstellar and galactic environments. After ~1 Myr, these stars settle down to become steady sources of soft X-rays. I use high-resolution…
Previous generations of X-ray observatories revealed a group of massive binaries that were relatively bright X-ray emitters. This was attributed to emission of shock-heated plasma in the wind-wind interaction zone located between the stars.…
Massive B and Be stars produce X-rays from shocks in high velocity winds with temperatures of a few million degrees and maximum X-ray luminosities of $\approx$ 10$^{31}$ erg/s. Surprisingly, a sub-group of early Be stars exhibits > 20 times…
X-ray emission is ubiquitous among massive stars. In the last decade, X-ray observations revolutionized our perception of stellar winds but opened a Pandora's box of urgent problems. X-rays penetrating stellar winds suffer mainly continuum…
Planetary nebulae (PNe) are an exciting addition to the zoo of X-ray sources. Recent Chandra and XMM-Newton observations have detected diffuse X-ray emission from shocked fast winds in PN interiors as well as bow-shocks of fast collimated…
Although the environments of star and planet formation are thermodynamically cold, substantial X-ray emission from 10-100 MK plasmas is present. In low mass pre-main sequence stars, X-rays are produced by violent magnetic reconnection…
We present a comprehensive study of X-ray emission and wind properties of massive magnetic early B-type stars. Dedicated XMM-Newton observations were obtained for three stars xi1 CMa, V2052 Oph, and zeta Cas. We report the first detection…
A mysterious X-ray-emitting object has been detected moving away from the high-mass gamma-ray binary PSR B1259-63, which contains a non-accreting pulsar and a Be star whose winds collide forming a complex interaction structure. Given the…
X-ray pulsars (XRPs) are accreting strongly magnetised neutron stars (NSs) in binary systems with, as a rule, massive optical companions. Very reach phenomenology and high observed flux put them into the focus of observational and…
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 calculate the X-ray emission from the shocked fast wind blown by the central stars of planetary nebulae (PNs) and compare with observations. Using spherically symmetric self similar solutions, we calculate the flow structure and X-ray…
A decade of X-ray stellar observations with Chandra and XMM-Newton has led to significant advances in our understanding of the physical processes at work in hot (magnetized) plasmas in stars and their immediate environment, providing new…
A subset (~ 10%) of massive stars present strong, globally ordered (mostly dipolar) magnetic fields. The trapping and channeling of their stellar winds in closed magnetic loops leads to magnetically confined wind shocks (MCWS), with…
We present X-ray observations of CU Vir performed with XMM-Newton and Chandra. With Lx = 3 x 10^28 erg/s the source is moderately X-ray bright, but its spectrum is extremely hard compared to other Ap stars. Spectral modelling requires…