Related papers: X-ray Polarization from High Mass X-ray Binaries
X-ray polarimetry promises to give qualitatively new information about high-energy astrophysical sources, such as binary black hole systems, micro-quasars, active galactic nuclei, and gamma-ray bursts. We designed, built and tested a hard…
Z-sources are a particular class of neutron star low-mass X-ray binaries characterized by a wide Z-like track in their hard colorsoft color (or hardness-intensity) diagrams, with three branches: the horizontal (HB), the normal (NB), and the…
The gravitational microlensing as a unique astrophysical tool can be used for studying the atmosphere of stars thousands of parsec far from us. This capability results from the bending of light rays in the gravitational field of a lens…
We report on recent progress in our theoretical understanding of X-ray binaries, which has largely been driven by new observations, and illustrate the interplay between theory and observations considering as examples intermediate-mass X-ray…
X-rays trace accretion onto compact objects in binaries with low mass companions at rates ranging up to near Eddington. Accretion at high rates onto neutron stars goes through cycles with time-scales of days to months. At lower average…
High energy polarization can be an indication of geometry, orientation, and other physical phenomena for a variety of sources, but has heretofore been a virtually unmeasured phenomenon. PoGOLite is a balloon-borne instrument intended to…
Polarization provides additional diagnostic opportunities for probing the structured environments of massive stars as well as the illumination of those environments by stars that are not spherical. After a brief overview of polarization…
We show that irradiation induced stellar winds can explain two important metallicity effects in X-ray binaries - the higher numbers and the softer spectra of the X-ray binaries in metal rich globular clusters compared to the metal poor…
Radiation from X-ray pulsars (XRPs) was expected to be strongly linearly polarized owing to a large difference in their ordinary and extraordinary mode opacities. The launch of IXPE allowed us to check this prediction. IXPE observed a dozen…
Planets reflect and linearly polarize the radiation that they receive from their host stars. The emergent polarization is sensitive to aspects of the planet atmosphere such as the gas composition and the occurrence of condensates and their…
Particle acceleration mechanisms in supermassive black hole jets, such as shock acceleration, magnetic reconnection, and turbulence, are expected to have observable signatures in the multi-wavelength polarization properties of blazars. The…
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…
Whether it is fluorescence emission from asteroids and moons, solar wind charge exchange from comets, exospheric escape from Mars, pion reactions on Venus, sprite lighting on Saturn, or the Io plasma torus in the Jovian magnetosphere, the…
X-ray polarization is a powerful tool to investigate the geometry of accreting material around black holes, allowing independent measurements of the black hole spin and orientation of the innermost parts of the accretion disk. We perform…
Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN), Seyfert galaxies and quasars, are powered by luminous accretion and often accompanied by winds which are powerful enough to affect the AGN mass budget, and whose observational appearance bears an imprint of…
X-ray polarimetry of accreting compact objects has revealed fast time variations in the polarization angle (PA), suggesting that the geometry and/or optical depth of the Comptonization region is changing rapidly. This prompts investigations…
I review the astrophysical insights arising from high-precision astrometric observations of X-ray binary systems, focussing primarily (but not exclusively) on recent results with very long baseline interferometry. Accurate,…
Gamma-ray binaries are systems containing a massive star and a compact object that have been detected up to TeV energies. The high energy emission could result from particle acceleration in the region where the stellar wind from the massive…
In recent decades, the relevance of polarimetry in planetary sciences and astronomy has increased rapidly. Polarization is a fundamental property of light and can be modified by any scattering event. As such, polarization yields additional…
While it may seem counterintuitive that X-ray astronomy should give any insights into low-temperature planetary systems, planets orbit stars whose magnetized surfaces divert a small fraction of the stellar energy into high energy products:…