Pulsating ultraluminous X-ray sources: modeling the thermal emission and polarization properties

TL;DR

This paper models the thermal emission and polarization properties of pulsating ultraluminous X-ray sources to understand their viewing geometry and improve interpretation of their observables.

Contribution

It introduces a simplified model for thermal emission from magnetized neutron stars in ULXs, incorporating polarization predictions and fitting observed spectra.

Findings

Best fitting geometries for PULXs identified

Polarization measurements can provide additional source information

Model predictions align with observed spectra and polarization data

Abstract

Ultraluminous X-ray sources (ULXs) are enigmatic sources first discovered in the 1980s in external galaxies. They are characterized by their extraordinarily high X-ray luminosity, which often exceeds $10^{40}\, \rm{erg \; s^{-1}}$. Our study aims to obtain more information about pulsating ULXs (PULXs), first of all, their viewing geometry, since it affects almost all the observables, such as the flux, the pulsed fraction, the polarization degree (PD), and polarization angle (PA). We present a simplified model, which primarily describes the thermal emission from an accreting, highly magnetized neutron star, simulating the contributions of an accretion disk and an accretion envelope surrounding the star magnetosphere, both described by a multicolor blackbody. Numerical calculations are used to determine the flux, PD, and PA of the emitted radiation, considering various viewing geometries. The model predictions are then compared to the observed spectra of two PULXs, M51 ULX-7 and NGC 7793 P13. We identified the best fitting geometries for these sources, obtaining values of the pulsed fraction and the temperature at the inner radius of the disk compatible with those obtained from previous works. We also found that measuring the polarization observables can give considerable additional information on the source.