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X-Ray Emission Lines: Present and Future Experiments

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 April 2016

H. Kunieda
H. Kunieda*
Affiliation:
Department of Astrophysics, Nagoya University, Furo-cho, Chikusa, Nagoya, Japan

Abstract

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After 34 years of X-ray astronomical observations, we approach the time when we will be able to explore AGN using line spectroscopy with newly developed technology and methods. In the beginning, X-rays from AGN were observed using proportional counters in a sort of photometric way, allowing us to determine that the continuum is a power law. This result suggested a predominance of non-thermal emission mechanisms in AGN. Rapid variability on time scales as short as 1000 seconds implied a small size for the X-ray emitting region, of order 1014cm, which is 3 orders of magnitude smaller than the optical emission-line regions.

The first detection of line emission from AGN was the Fe-K line by the GINGA satellite. The line energy was 6.4 keV and its equivalent width was about 150 eV in Seyfert 1 galaxies. Detection became possible by use of large-area, low-noise proportional counters. The Fe-K line emission is important in X-ray astronomy because iron is rather abundant and this line is isolated in energy from neighboring lines.

The Fe-K line profile has been examined with the CCD detectors on board ASCA. Many Seyfert 1 galaxies exhibit a broad-line profile of more than 1 keV width with an asymmetric tail on the low-energy side. This is explained as the fluorescence line from a relativistic accretion disk around a black hole, which is broadened by the Doppler motion and distorted by the strong gravitational field. The CCD detectors also revealed the absorption edges of warm material in the line of sight, which is ionized by the strong emission from AGN.

In the next decade, new spectrometers will be launched which can perform spectroscopy with E/dE > 100: AXAF in 1998, XMM in 1999, and Astro-E in 2000. Dispersive spectrometers on board AXAF and XMM will be powerful tools for low-energy lines, while the calorimeter on board Astro-E will examine the Fe-K line profile. Spectral resolution E/dE of several hundred will reveal the intensity ratio of satellite and resonance lines. This will give us physical parameters, such as the density and absolute size of surrounding matter. We hope that the structure of the nucleus will be more deeply understood using X-ray spectroscopy with new instruments, and we will come close to the level of optical spectroscopy, which has worked well in the study of the outskirts of AGN.

Type
I. X-Rays and the Nuclear Regions of Active Galaxies
Information
International Astronomical Union Colloquium , Volume 159: Emission Lines in Active Galaxies: New Methods and Techniques , 1997 , pp. 1 - 19
Copyright
Copyright © Astronomical Society of the Pacific 1997

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