HIGH-ENERGY X-RAYS FROM J174545.5-285829, THE CANNONBALL: A CANDIDATE PULSAR WIND NEBULA ASSOCIATED WITH Sgr A EAST

Journal Article · Sun Dec 01 04:00:00 EST 2013 · Astrophysical Journal Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1088/2041-8205/778/2/L31· OSTI ID:22364113

Nynka, Melania; Hailey, Charles J.; Mori, Kaya; Gotthelf, Eric V.; Zhang, Shuo ^[1]; Baganoff, Frederick K. ^[2]; Bauer, Franz E. ^[3]; Boggs, Steven E.; Craig, William W. ^[4]; Christensen, Finn E. ^[5]; Harrison, Fiona A. ^[6]; Hong, Jaesub ^[7]; Perez, Kerstin M. ^[8]; Stern, Daniel ^[9]; Zhang, William W. ^[10]

---

1. Columbia Astrophysics Laboratory, Columbia University, New York, NY 10027 (United States)
2. Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139 (United States)
3. Instituto de Astrofísica, Facultad de Física, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, 306, Santiago 22 (Chile)
4. Space Sciences Laboratory, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720 (United States)
5. DTU Space—National Space Institute, Technical University of Denmark, Elektrovej 327, DK-2800 Lyngby (Denmark)
6. Cahill Center for Astronomy and Astrophysics, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125 (United States)
7. Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge, MA 02138 (United States)
8. Columbia University, New York, NY 10027 (United States)
9. Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91109 (United States)
10. NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD 20771 (United States)

We report the unambiguous detection of non-thermal X-ray emission up to 30 keV from the Cannonball, a few-arcsecond long diffuse X-ray feature near the Galactic Center, using the NuSTAR X-ray observatory. The Cannonball is a high-velocity (v {sub proj} ∼ 500 km s{sup –1}) pulsar candidate with a cometary pulsar wind nebula (PWN) located ∼2' north-east from Sgr A*, just outside the radio shell of the supernova remnant Sagittarius A (Sgr A) East. Its non-thermal X-ray spectrum, measured up to 30 keV, is well characterized by a Γ ∼ 1.6 power law, typical of a PWN, and has an X-ray luminosity of L(3-30 keV) = 1.3 × 10{sup 34} erg s{sup –1}. The spectral and spatial results derived from X-ray and radio data strongly suggest a runaway neutron star born in the Sgr A East supernova event. We do not find any pulsed signal from the Cannonball. The NuSTAR observations allow us to deduce the PWN magnetic field and show that it is consistent with the lower limit obtained from radio observations.

• OSTI ID: 22364113
• Journal Information: Astrophysical Journal Letters, Journal Name: Astrophysical Journal Letters Journal Issue: 2 Vol. 778; ISSN 2041-8205
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS
ASTRONOMY
ASTROPHYSICS
COSMIC PHOTONS
DETECTION
KEV RANGE
LUMINOSITY
MAGNETIC FIELDS
MILKY WAY
NEBULAE
NEUTRON STARS
PULSARS
SUPERNOVA REMNANTS
VELOCITY
X RADIATION
X-RAY SPECTRA