Short term X-ray spectral variability of the strong iron-k absorption feature in PDS 456
Abstract
We present a recent 500 ks Suzaku and a simultaneous 500 ks XMM-Newton & NuSTAR observations, carried out in 2013, of the nearby (z=0.184) luminous (L_{bol}∼10^{47} erg s^{-1}) quasar PDS 456. Short term X-ray spectral variability, including the presence of a strong and rapidly variable iron-K absorption feature, is observed and subsequently investigated. Here, our attention is focused on the physical interpretation of the short term variability where two models are adopted in the spectral analysis (partial covering vs coronal changes), leading to two valid interpretations. In the partial covering scenario, rapidly varying absorption is due to inhomogeneous dense material and such short timescale changes also entail that that the absorption is due to gas located in the vicinity of the black hole possibly shielding part of the outflow. In the second scenario, the complex spectral variability is due to variations in the intrinsic continuum observed as changes in the soft X-ray spectrum leading subsequent changes in the hard X-ray power-law, possibly induced by Comptonisation in the disc corona. Furthermore it was possible to extrapolate the size and the location of the absorber, its outflowing velocity and a direct estimation of the size of the X-ray emitting region ∼20 R_{g}.
- Publication:
-
The X-ray Universe 2014
- Pub Date:
- July 2014
- Bibcode:
- 2014xru..confE.284M