X-ray Reverberation Mapping of Ci Cam

Bartlett, Elizabeth; Garcia, M.
Bibliographical reference

American Astronomical Society, AAS Meeting #213, #410.15; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 41, p.214

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1
2009
Number of authors
2
IAC number of authors
0
Citations
0
Refereed citations
0
Description
We have analyzed the X-ray lightcurve of the star CI Cam, the optical counterpart of the X-ray transient XTE J0421+56 using data from XMM-Newton. Our motivation is based on evidence from ground based optical interferometry from the Keck and IOTA observatories which suggests that the dust surrounding CI CAM has a taurus morphology rather than a spherical distribution as previously hypothesized. By using a technique known as reverberation mapping we have constrained the time delay between the continuum of CI Cam and the Fe-K fluorescence line, corresponding to the reflection of the continuum off the dusty taurus. The time delay yields information on the size of the taurus.