Eta Carinae is an extremely massive binary system whose strong winds produce avariety of high-energy X-ray and possibly gamma-ray emission. Earlierobservations found interesting features in the extremely hard X-ray band: i) aflat spectral component above 9 keV toward the flux maximum; ii) strong 15-20keV emission during an occultation of the wind-wind colliding plasma; iii)stable power-law emission above 25 keV. These features are signs of the highestenergy processes yet detected in any colliding wind binary. Broad band X-rayobservations around periastron are essential to understand those features. Wetherefore propose joint XMM-Newton and NuSTAR observations at 4 key phasesaround the next periastron passage of Eta Carinae in 2014.6.
Instrument
EMOS1, EMOS2, EPN, OM, RGS1, RGS2
Temporal Coverage
2014-06-06T19:13:05Z/2014-07-29T01:16:03Z
Version
17.56_20190403_1200
Mission Description
The European Space Agencys (ESA) X-ray Multi-Mirror Mission (XMM-Newton) was launched by an Ariane 504 on December 10th 1999. XMM-Newton is ESAs second cornerstone of the Horizon 2000 Science Programme. It carries 3 high throughput X-ray telescopes with an unprecedented effective area, and an optical monitor, the first flown on a X-ray observatory. The large collecting area and ability to make long uninterrupted exposures provide highly sensitive observations. Since Earths atmosphere blocks out all X-rays, only a telescope in space can detect and study celestial X-ray sources. The XMM-Newton mission is helping scientists to solve a number of cosmic mysteries, ranging from the enigmatic black holes to the origins of the Universe itself. Observing time on XMM-Newton is being made available to the scientific community, applying for observational periods on a competitive basis.
European Space Agency, Dr Kenji Hamaguchi, 2015, 'Probing the Highest Energy Phenomena of Eta Carinae around Periastron in 2014', 17.56_20190403_1200, European Space Agency, https://doi.org/10.5270/esa-prg784r
