Searching for the warm-hot intergalactic medium using XMM-Newton high-resolution X-ray spectra

Abstract

The problem of missing baryons in the local universe remains an open question. One propose alternative is that at low redshift missing baryons are in the form of the Warm Hot Intergalactic Medium (WHIM). In order to test this idea, we present a detailed analysis of X-ray high-resolution spectra of six extragalactic sources, Mrk 421, 1ES 1028+511, 1ES 1553+113, H2356-309, PKS 0558-504 and PG 1116+215, obtained with the XMM-Newton Reflection Grating Spectrometer to search for signals of WHIM and/or circumgalactic medium (CGM) X-ray absorbing gas. We fit the X-ray absorption with the IONeq model, allowing us to take into account the presence of X-ray spectral features due to the multiphase component of the local ISM. An additional IONeq component is included to model the WHIM absorption, instead of the traditional Gaussian absorption line modeling. We found no statistical improvement in the fits when including such component in any of the sources, concluding that we can safely reject a successful detection of WHIM absorbers towards these lines of sights. Our simulation shows that the presence of the multiphase ISM absorption features prevents detection of low-redshift WHIM absorption features in the 17 A spectral region for moderate exposures using high-resolution spectra.

12 pages, 7 figures

References in corpus (14)

• X-Ray Absorption from the Milky Way Halo and the Local Group
• Physical Properties, Baryon Content, and Evolution of the LyαForest: New Insights from High Resolution Observations at z < 0.4
• High-Resolution X-ray Spectroscopy of the Interstellar Medium II: Neon and Iron Absorption Edges
• On the Putative Detection of z>0 X-ray Absorption Features in the Spectrum of Markarian 421
• XMM-Newton Survey of Local O VII Absorption Lines in the Spectra of Active Galactic Nuclei
• ISMabs: a comprehensive X-ray absorption model for the interstellar medium
• The Physical Origins of the Identified and Still Missing Components of the Warm-Hot Intergalactic Medium: Insights from Deep Surveys in the Field of Blazar 1ES1553+113
• A comparison of cosmological filaments catalogues
• Probing the structure of the gas in the Milky Way through X-ray high resolution spectroscopy
• K-shell photoionization of Na-like to Cl-like ions of Mg, Si, S, Ar, and Ca
• Physical properties of the interstellar medium using high-resolution Chandra spectra: O K-edge absorption
• Warm-hot gas in groups and galaxies toward H2356-309
• disnht: modeling X-ray absorption from distributed column densities
• Simultaneous detection of an intrinsic absorber and a compact jet emission in the X-ray binary IGR J17091-3624 during a hard accretion state

Cited by in corpus (3)

• Probing the physical properties of the IGM using SRG/eROSITA spectra from blazars
• Detection of pure warm-hot intergalactic medium emission from a $7.2$ Mpc long filament in the Shapley supercluster using X-ray spectroscopy
• Argon X-ray absorption in the local ISM