Title:	Orbital phase spectroscopy of X-ray pulsars to study the stellar wind of the companion
Authors:	Mukherjee, U. Paul, Biswajit
Issue Date:	Jan-2006
Publisher:	Elsevier B.V.
Citation:	Advances in Space Research, 2006, Vol. 38, p2774-2776
Abstract:	High Mass X-ray Binary Pulsars (HMXBP), in which the companion star is a source of supersonic stellar wind, provide a laboratory to probe the velocity and density profile of such winds. Here, we have measured the variation of the absorption column density along with other spectral parameters over the binary orbit for two HMXBP in elliptical orbits, as observed with the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer (RXTE) and the BeppoSAX satellites. A spherically symmetric wind profile was used as a model to compare the observed column density variations. In 4U 1538-52, we find the model corroborating the observations; whereas in GX 301-2, the stellar wind appears to be very clumpy and a smooth symmetric wind model seems to be inadequate in explaining the variation in column density.
Description:	Restricted Access. An open-access version is available at arXiv.org (one of the alternative locations)
URI:	http://hdl.handle.net/2289/4952
ISSN:	0273-1177
Alternative Location:	http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2006AdSpR..38.2774M http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0512095 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.asr.2006.01.023
Copyright:	2006 Elsevier B.V.
Appears in Collections:	Research Papers (A&A)

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