The Swift Monitoring Campaign of Sagittarius A*
Abstract
Starting in 2006, the center of our Galaxy has been monitored on a nearly daily basis with the X-ray telescope on-board the Swift satellite. The short pointed observations have offered a unique view of the long-term X-ray behavior of Sgr A*, in particular of its X-ray flaring properties. The Swift campaign also provides an excellent setup to closely monitor the interaction of the supermassive black hole with the dense cold gas cloud (G2) that is on a collision course with Sgr A* and is projected to make a close encounter in the fall of 2013. I will present the results of 7 years of Swift X-ray monitoring of Sgr A*, and give an outlook of how this program can be used to study the X-ray emission as G2 breaks up and feeds gas to the supermassive black hole.
- Publication:
-
AAS/High Energy Astrophysics Division #13
- Pub Date:
- April 2013
- Bibcode:
- 2013HEAD...1340301D