Effects of Interstellar Dust Scattering on the X-ray Eclipses of the LMXB AX J1745.6-2901 in the Galactic Center

TL;DR

This study investigates how interstellar dust scattering affects the X-ray eclipse profiles of the LMXB AX J1745.6-2901, revealing multiple dust layers along the line of sight and emphasizing the importance of dust scattering considerations in X-ray variability studies.

Contribution

It provides detailed modeling and evidence that dust scattering causes peculiar eclipse features, identifying multiple dust layers and their impact on observed X-ray light curves.

Findings

X-ray eclipse shapes depend on photon energy and instrument PSF.

Multiple foreground dust layers influence the eclipse profiles.

A local dust layer and a nearby layer within a few hundred parsecs were identified.

Abstract

AX J1745.6-2901 is an eclipsing low mass X-ray binary (LMXB) in the Galactic Centre (GC). It shows significant X-ray excess emission during the eclipse phase, and its eclipse light curve shows an asymmetric shape. We use archival XMM-Newton and Chandra observations to study the origin of these peculiar X-ray eclipsing phenomena. We find that the shape of the observed X-ray eclipse light curves depends on both photon energy and the shape of the source extraction region, and also shows differences between the two instruments. By performing detailed simulations for the time-dependent X-ray dust scattering halo, as well as directly modelling the observed eclipse and non-eclipse halo profiles of AX J1745.6-2901, we obtained solid evidence that its peculiar eclipse phenomena are indeed caused by the X-ray dust scattering in multiple foreground dust layers along the line-of-sight (LOS). The apparent dependence on the instruments is caused by different instrumental point-spread-functions. Our results can be used to assess the influence of dust scattering in other eclipsing X-ray sources, and raise the importance of considering the timing effects of dust scattering halo when studying the variability of other X-ray sources in the GC, such as Sgr A*. Moreover, our study of halo eclipse reinforces the existence of a dust layer local to AX J1745.6-2901 as reported by Jin et al. (2017), as well as identifying another dust layer within a few hundred parsecs to Earth, containing up to several tens of percent LOS dust, which is likely to be associated with the molecular clouds in the Solar neighbourhood. The remaining LOS dust is likely to be associated with the molecular clouds located in the Galactic disk in-between.