A New Measurement of the Spin and Orbital Parameters of the High Mass X-ray Binary Centaurus X-3 using AstroSat

Abstract

We present the timing results of out-of-eclipse observations of Centaurus X-3 spanning half a binary orbit, performed on 12-13 December, 2016 with the Large Area X-ray Proportional Counter (LAXPC) on-board AstroSat. The pulse profile was confirmed to exhibit a prominent pulse peak with a secondary inter-pulse. The systemic spin period of the pulsar was found to be $4.80188\pm 0.000085$ s in agreement with its spin up trend. The spin up timescale seems to have increased to $7709\pm 58$ yr that points to negative torque effects in the inner accretion disk. We also report the derived values of projected semi-major axis and orbital velocity of the neutron star.

Accepted for publication in the Special Issue of Journal of Astrophysics and Astronomy on AstroSat: Five Years in Orbit, 7 pages, 6 figures

References in corpus (5)

• The ephemeris, orbital decay, and masses of 10 eclipsing HMXBs
• Large Area X-ray Proportional Counter (LAXPC) Instrument on AstroSat and Some Preliminary Results from its performance in the orbit
• Pulse phase resolved analysis of the HMXB Cen X-3 over two binary orbits
• Observing Compact Stars with AstroSat
• Neutron Stars in X-ray Binaries and their Environments

Cited by in corpus (4)

• A catalogue of high-mass X-ray binaries in the Galaxy: from the INTEGRAL to the Gaia era
• Catalog of the Galactic population of X-ray pulsars in High-mass X-ray binary systems
• Timing and spectral studies of Cen X-3 in multiple luminosity states using $\text{AstroSat}$
• On the origin of super-global spin-up trends of X-ray pulsars in HMXB systems