Abstract Details
| Name: Ranjeev Misra Affiliation: IUCAA Conference ID: ASI2017_853 Title : ASTROSAT: A New Era for Rapid X-ray Timing Studies Authors and Co-Authors : ASTROSAT LAXPC Science Team Abstract Type : Abstract Category : Plenary Abstract : From 1995 till 2011, the Rossi X-ray timing experiment (RXTE) revolutionized our understanding of the rapid time variability of X-ray binaries. A host of amazing phenomena were discovered such as Quasi-Periodic Oscillations (QPOs) ranging from a few Hz to kHz, Burst Oscillations, and broad band variability. These phenomena originate close to the black hole or neutron star and hence are linked to their strong gravity described by General Relativity. With the successful launch of ASTROSAT the field has entered into a new era. ASTROSAT/LAXPC has a larger effective area at energies > 20 keV than RXTE, and unlike RXTE generates event mode data for all observations. Moreover, the multi-wavelength capability of ASTROSAT allows for the first time to obtain broad band spectrum at the time when the rapid timing phenomena are observed. The talk will discuss these capabilities and indicate how with ASTROSAT one can do sophisticated analysis such as energy dependent temporal studies and time/frequency resolved spectroscopy which will open up new ways to unravel the enigmatic nature of X-ray binaries. |