2025/03/22 by Manoj Mandal, Sabyasachi Pal, G. K. Jaisawal +3 · 1 voice
Physics and Astronomy · #astro-ph.HE
paper · pdf · doi:10.1016/j.jheap.2025.100387
arxiv published 2025/03/22 · arxiv updated 2025/04/24
We report the broadband timing and spectral properties of the neutron star low-mass X-ray binary Aql X-1 during the 2024 outburst with NICER, NuSTAR, and Swift observatories. We detected six thermonuclear X-ray bursts during the NICER and NuSTAR observations, with the observed X-ray burst profiles exhibiting a strong energy dependence. The time-resolved burst spectra indicate the presence of soft excess during the burst, which can be modeled by using a variable persistent emission method (fa method), or the relxillNS reflection model. We found that the reflection model can contribute ∼20% of total emission as observed during the NICER burst. The reflection and blackbody component fluxes are strongly correlated as observed during a burst. The excess emission is possible due to the enhanced mass accretion rate to the neutron star due to the Poynting-Rodertson drag and a fraction of burst emission may be reflected from the disk. The bursts did not show photospheric radius expansion during the peak. Moreover, we examined the burst-free accretion emission in the broadband range with NuSTAR, NICER, and Swift at two epochs of the outburst. The persistent emission showed X-ray reflection feature, which can be well modeled with the relativistic reflection model relxillCp. The inner disk radius (Rin) is found to be nearly 22 and 10 times \rm Rg for two observations, respectively. Assuming that the inner disk is truncated at the magnetospheric radius, the magnetic field strength at the poles of the neutron star is estimated to be (0.6-1.9) × 109 G.