[vsnet-alert 10205] (ATEL) V2491 Cyg now supersoft X-ray source

Taichi Kato tkato at kusastro.kyoto-u.ac.jp
Wed May 21 12:41:51 JST 2008


Nova V2491 Cyg has become a bright super-soft source 

ATel #1542; J P Osborne, K Page, P Evans, A Beardmore (U. Leicester, 
UK), E Kuulkers, A Ibarra (ESA/ESAC, Spain), J-U Ness, S Starrfield 
(Arizona State U., USA), M Bode (Liverpool John Moores U., UK), J J 
Drake (SAO/CfA, USA), M Orio (INAF-Padova, Italy), J Krautter 
(Heidelberg U, Germany), G Schwarz (West Chester U., USA). M 
Tsujimoto (PSU, USA), D Takei (Rikkyo U, Japan) on 20 May 2008; 23:24 
UT Password Certification: Julian P Osborne (julo at star.le.ac.uk) 

Subjects: X-ray, Novae 

Continued monitoring of nova V2491 Cyg by the Swift X-ray Telescope 
has revealed the rapid emergence of a bright soft X-ray component. In 
addition a Suzaku observation shows that strong low energy X-ray 
emission lines have been present. 

Recent Swift observations from day 36 after outburst (May 16) show a 
very strongly increasing XRT count rate, reaching ~5 c/sec on day 38. 
This factor of ten flux increase in approximately two days is in 
stark contrast to the prior increase by this factor which took 18 
days (see ATel #1523). The recent rapid flux rise has not been 
monotonic. 

The newly-emerged X-ray flux is very soft (E<0.6 keV), and can be 
roughly fit with a blackbody with kT~0.033 keV (in addition to a much 
fainter hard spectral component). A blackbody may not be a physically 
meaningful model, although it serves as an empirical description; 
other very soft spectral models may also fit. 

An observation with the Suzaku XIS on day 29 (May 9), before the 
rapid flux increase reported here, shows strong emission lines from K 
shell N, O and Ne lines. 

The rapid, non-monotonic soft X-ray flux increase of V2491 Cyg again 
appears very similar to the behaviour seen by Swift from the 
recurrent nova RS Oph 2006 at the start of its super-soft phase. The 
early emergence of the super-soft phase may indicate that the white 
dwarf in V2491 Cyg is similarly massive. 

Swift continues to observe (at an increased rate). We thank the Swift 
PI and operations team for their support. 


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