TY - JOUR
T1 - The Chandra Carina Complex Project
T2 - Deciphering the enigma of Carina's diffuse X-ray emission
AU - Townsley, Leisa K.
AU - Broos, Patrick S.
AU - Chu, You Hua
AU - Gagné, Marc
AU - Garmire, Gordon P.
AU - Gruendl, Robert A.
AU - Hamaguchi, Kenji
AU - Mac Low, Mordecai Mark
AU - Montmerle, Thierry
AU - Nazé, Yal
AU - Oey, M. S.
AU - Park, Sangwook
AU - Petre, Robert
AU - Pittard, Julian M.
PY - 2011/5
Y1 - 2011/5
N2 - We present a 1.42 deg2 mosaic of diffuse X-ray emission in the Great Nebula in Carina from the Chandra X-ray Observatory Advanced CCD Imaging Spectrometer camera. After removing >14,000 X-ray point sources from the field, we smooth the remaining unresolved emission, tessellate it into segments of similar apparent surface brightness, and perform X-ray spectral fitting on those tessellates to infer the intrinsic properties of the X-ray-emitting plasma. By modeling faint resolved point sources, we estimate the contribution to the extended X-ray emission from unresolved point sources and show that the vast majority of Carina's unresolved X-ray emission is truly diffuse. Line-like correlated residuals in the X-ray spectral fits suggest that substantial X-ray emission is generated by charge exchange at the interfaces between Carina's hot, rarefied plasma and its many cold neutral pillars, ridges, and clumps.
AB - We present a 1.42 deg2 mosaic of diffuse X-ray emission in the Great Nebula in Carina from the Chandra X-ray Observatory Advanced CCD Imaging Spectrometer camera. After removing >14,000 X-ray point sources from the field, we smooth the remaining unresolved emission, tessellate it into segments of similar apparent surface brightness, and perform X-ray spectral fitting on those tessellates to infer the intrinsic properties of the X-ray-emitting plasma. By modeling faint resolved point sources, we estimate the contribution to the extended X-ray emission from unresolved point sources and show that the vast majority of Carina's unresolved X-ray emission is truly diffuse. Line-like correlated residuals in the X-ray spectral fits suggest that substantial X-ray emission is generated by charge exchange at the interfaces between Carina's hot, rarefied plasma and its many cold neutral pillars, ridges, and clumps.
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U2 - 10.1088/0067-0049/194/1/15
DO - 10.1088/0067-0049/194/1/15
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:79957614272
SN - 0067-0049
VL - 194
JO - Astrophysical Journal, Supplement Series
JF - Astrophysical Journal, Supplement Series
IS - 1
M1 - 15
ER -