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Optical and X-ray luminosity of expanding nebulae around ultraluminous X-ray sources

Siwek, M.; Sadowski, A.; Narayan, R.; Roberts, T.P.; Soria, R.

Optical and X-ray luminosity of expanding nebulae around ultraluminous X-ray sources Thumbnail


Authors

M. Siwek

A. Sadowski

R. Narayan

R. Soria



Abstract

We have performed a set of simulations of expanding, spherically symmetric nebulae inflated by winds from accreting black holes in ultraluminous X-ray sources (ULXs). We implemented a realistic cooling function to account for free-free and bound-free cooling. For all model parameters we considered, the forward shock in the interstellar medium becomes radiative at a radius ∼ 100 pc. The emission is primarily in the optical and UV, and the radiative luminosity is about 50% of the total kinetic luminosity of the wind. In contrast, the reverse shock in the wind is adiabatic so long as the terminal outflow velocity of the wind vw & 0.003c. The shocked wind in these models radiates in X-rays, but with a luminosity of only ∼ 1035 erg s−1 . For wind velocities vw . 0.001c, the shocked wind becomes radiative, but it is no longer hot enough to produce Xrays. Instead it emits in optical and UV, and the radiative luminosity is comparable to 100% of the wind kinetic luminosity. We suggest that measuring the optical luminosities and putting limits on the X-ray and radio emission from shock-ionized ULX bubbles may help in estimating the mass outflow rate of the central accretion disk and the velocity of the outflow.

Citation

Siwek, M., Sadowski, A., Narayan, R., Roberts, T., & Soria, R. (2017). Optical and X-ray luminosity of expanding nebulae around ultraluminous X-ray sources. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 470(1), 361-371. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stx1185

Journal Article Type Article
Acceptance Date May 11, 2017
Online Publication Date May 17, 2017
Publication Date Aug 1, 2017
Deposit Date May 15, 2017
Publicly Available Date Mar 29, 2024
Journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Print ISSN 0035-8711
Electronic ISSN 1365-2966
Publisher Royal Astronomical Society
Peer Reviewed Peer Reviewed
Volume 470
Issue 1
Pages 361-371
DOI https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stx1185
Related Public URLs https://arxiv.org/pdf/1705.04235.pdf

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Copyright Statement
This article has been accepted for publication in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society ©: 2017 The Authors Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Royal Astronomical Society. All rights reserved.






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