A dataset provided by the European Space Agency

Proposal ID 0320042
Obs ID 03200420001
Title New Black Hole X-Ray Novae in the Galactic Halo
Download Data Associated to the proposal https://isla.esac.esa.int/tap/download/bundle?format=ascii_curl&product_id=prop_id:0320042
DOI https://doi.org/10.57780/esa-vmyaonv
Author Cadolle Bel
Abstract Black Holes (BH) in the thick disc and/or halo of the Milky Way galaxy appear sporadically as X-ray Novae (XN) with very hard spectra. The origin of these objects are among the most intriguing problems in high-energy astrophysics: they could have been shot out from the Galactic Plane (GP), or be pristine BH formed in the galactic halo before the galactic disc was formed. At latitudes |b| > 5 deg, BH XN are likely to be close to the Sun, bright, optically unobscured; the compact radio counterpart is subject to low interstellar scattering. The proposed study will allow to: 1) probe the connection between accretion disc instabilities and the formation of relativistic jets in all wavelength bands; 2) know whether the radio, infrared and optical non-thermal components and the gamma-ray events originate -as recently found in quasars- within the same shocked area downstream the relativistic jet and 3) determine the space velocity of the binary centre of mass to know where these BH come from. The discovery of XTE J1118+48 (62 deg off the GP, Lx < 1e36 erg/s at its peak) rises the suspicion that we may have so far missed a large population of BH in the galactic thick disc and/or halo. We wish to know whether there are fundamental differences between BH in the halo compared to BH in the disc. Furthermore, some of these accreting BH in low mass X-ray binaries could be micro-blazars; it is still an open question their possible relation to a subset of soft and variable unidentified EGRET sources that are spread at medium/high latitude, most assembled within 30 deg from the Galactic Centre (GC). In the framework of Target of Opportunity (ToO) observations, we aim to observe new BH XN at |b| > 5 deg not subject to INTEGRAL Core Program ToO, altogether with multiwavelength observations with UV/opt/IR/radio telescopes. This proposal was submitted for AO 1 and AO 2 in correlation with XN in the galactic bulge, approved by TAC with the highest priority but not triggered so far.
Publications
Temporal Coverage 2005-08-10T13:32:51Z / 2005-08-12T15:32:12Z
Version 1.0
Mission Description The INTEGRAL (International Gamma-Ray Astrophysics Laboratory) mission, launched by the European Space Agency (ESA) on October 17, 2002, was designed to study high-energy phenomena in the universe. INTEGRAL was operating until february 2025 and it was equipped with three high-energy instruments: the Imager on Board the INTEGRAL Satellite (IBIS), the Spectrometer on INTEGRAL (SPI), and the JEM-X (Joint European Monitor for X-rays). Its Optical Monitoring Camera (OMC) provided optical V-band magnitude measurements, complementing the high-energy observations.
Creator Contact https://www.cosmos.esa.int/web/integral/helpdesk
Date Published 2025-03-25T09:54:32Z
Publisher And Registrant European Space Agency
Credit Guidelines European Space Agency, Cadolle Bel, 2025, ' New Black Hole X-Ray Novae in the Galactic Halo', 1.0, European Space Agency, https://doi.org/10.57780/esa-vmyaonv