An XMM-Newton view of M101 - III. Diffuse X-ray emission

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dc.creatorWarwick, R. S.
dc.creatorJenkins, L. P.
dc.creatorRead, A. M.
dc.creatorRoberts, T. P.
dc.creatorOwen, R. A.
dc.date2007-02-15
dc.date.accessioned2026-07-07T10:21:48Z
dc.date.available2026-07-07T10:21:48Z
dc.descriptionWe present a study of the X-ray properties of the nearby face-on Scd spiral galaxy M101 based on recent XMM-Newton observations. In this third and final paper in the present series, we focus on the spatial and spectral properties of the residual emission, after excluding bright X-ray sources with L(X) > 10^37 erg/s. Within a central region of radius 10 arcmins (21 kpc), the X-ray emission broadly traces the pattern of the spiral arms, establishing a strong link with recent star formation, but it also exhibits a radial scale length of \~2.6 arcmins (5.4 kpc) consistent with optical data. We estimate the soft X-ray luminosity within the central 5 arcmins (10.5 kpc) region to be L(X) ~2.1 x 10^39 erg/s (0.5-2 keV), the bulk of which appears to originate as diffuse emission. We find a two-temperature thermal model best fits the spectral data with derived temperatures of 0.20 +/- 0.01 keV and 0.68^(+0.06)_(-0.04) keV which are very typical of the diffuse components seen in other normal and starburst galaxies. More detailed investigation of the X-ray morphology reveals a strong correlation with images recorded in the far-UV through to V band, with the best match being with the U band. We interpret these results in terms of a clumpy thin-disk component which traces the spiral arms of M101 plus an extended lower-halo component with large filling factor.
dc.description10 pages, 5 figures (figs 1 & 4 submitted as jpgs), accepted for publication in MNRAS
dc.identifierhttps://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0702408
dc.identifierhttp://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0702408
dc.identifierMon.Not.Roy.Astron.Soc.376:1611-1620,2007
dc.identifierdoi:10.1111/j.1365-2966.2007.11571.x
dc.identifier.urihttp://salesiana.dossiersoluciones.com/handle/123456789/175295
dc.subjectAstrophysics
dc.titleAn XMM-Newton view of M101 - III. Diffuse X-ray emission
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