StrayCats: A catalog of NuSTAR Stray Light Observations

Abstract

We present StrayCats: a catalog of NuSTAR stray light observations of X-ray sources. Stray light observations arise for sources 1--4${}^{\circ }$ away from the telescope pointing direction. At this off-axis angle, X-rays pass through a gap between optics and aperture stop and so do not interact with the X-ray optics but, instead, directly illuminate the NuSTAR focal plane. We have systematically identified and examined over 1400 potential observations resulting in a catalog of 436 telescope fields and 78 stray light sources that have been identified. The sources identified include historically known persistently bright X-ray sources, X-ray binaries in outburst, pulsars, and Type I X-ray bursters. In this paper we present an overview of the catalog and how we identified the StrayCats sources and the analysis techniques required to produce high level science products. Finally, we present a few brief examples of the science quality of these unique data.

arXiv comment17 pages, 14 figures, Accepted in ApJ

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• A Systematic View of Ten New Black Hole Spins
• NuSTAR measurement of the cosmic X-ray background in the 3-20 keV energy band
• Geminga's pulsar halo: an X-ray view
• Measuring the Cosmic X-ray Background in 3-20keV with Straylight from NuSTAR
• Extending the baseline for SMC X-1's spin and orbital behavior with NuSTAR stray light
• StrayCats II: An Updated Catalog of NuSTAR Stray Light Observations
• Revealing the spectral state transition of the Clocked Burster, GS 1826-238 with NuSTAR StrayCats
• Identification of an X-ray Pulsar in the BeXRB system IGR J18219$-$1347
• NuSTAR spectral analysis beyond 79 keV with stray light
• Wavelet-based image decomposition method for NuSTAR stray light background studies
• 2021 Effective Area calibration of the Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope ARray (NuSTAR)