Swift/BAT and RXTE/ASM Observations of the 35-day X-ray Cycle of Hercules X-1

TL;DR

This study analyzes a 14.5-year dataset of Her X-1's 35-day X-ray cycle using Swift/BAT and RXTE/ASM observations, revealing cycle length variability, phase distribution, and energy-dependent variability consistent with a precessing accretion disk model.

Contribution

It provides a detailed timing analysis of Her X-1's 35-day cycle using long-term data from two instruments, including cycle length distribution and phase analysis.

Findings

Cycle length distribution fits a Gaussian with mean 34.79 days.

Cycle peaks are uniformly distributed in orbital phase, with a Gaussian peak at phase 0.5.

Energy-dependent variability supports a precessing accretion disk model.

Abstract

Swift/BAT and RXTE/ASM observations have monitored the X-ray binary system Her X-1 for approximately 14.5 years each, and both were monitoring Her X-1 for a period of ~5.5 years. Here we study the 35-day cycle using these observations. Using a cross-correlation method we find the times of peaks of the 35-day cycles for ~150 cycles observed by Swift/BAT and ~150 cycles observed by RXTE/ASM. These cycles include ~60 observed with both instruments. The noise level of the RXTE/ASM measurements is larger than that of Swift/BAT, resulting in larger uncertainty in peak times. The distribution of 35-day cycle lengths can be fit with a Gaussian with mean 34.79 d and $\sigma$ of 1.1 d. The distribution of orbital phases of 35-day cycle peaks is well fit by a uniform distribution, with 76 percent of the cycles, plus a Gaussian distribution peaked at orbital phase ~0.5, with 24 percent of the cycles. We construct the long-term average 35-day lightcurve in the 15-50 keV band from Swift/BAT, and in the 2-12 keV band from RXTE/ASM. The high energy band shows more variability in the Short High state and the low energy band shows more variability in the Main High state. This is consistent with a precessing accretion disk model as cause of the 35-day cycle.