A Large X-Ray Flare from a Single Weak-Lined T Tauri Star TWA-7 Detected with MAXI GSC
Abstract
We present a large X-ray flare from a nearby weak-lined T Tauri star TWA-7 detected with the Gas Slit Camera (GSC) on the Monitor of All-sky X-ray Image (MAXI). The GSC captured X-ray flaring from TWA-7 with a flux of 3 × 10-9erg cm-2s-1 in 2-20 keV band during the scan transit starting at 2010-09-07 18:24:30 (UT). The estimated X-ray luminosity at the scan in the energy band is 3 × 1032erg s-1, indicating that the event is among the largest X-ray flares from T Tauri stars. Since MAXI GSC monitors a target only during a scan transit of about a minute per 92 min orbital cycle, the luminosity at the flare peak might have been higher than that detected. At the scan transit, we observed a high X-ray-to-bolometric luminosity ratio, log Lx / Lbol0.1+0.2-0.3; i.e., the X-ray luminosity is comparable to the bolometric luminosity. Since TWA-7 has neither an accreting disk nor a binary companion, the observed event implies that none of those are essential to generate such big flares in T Tauri stars.
- Publication:
-
Publications of the Astronomical Society of Japan
- Pub Date:
- November 2011
- DOI:
- 10.1093/pasj/63.sp3.S713
- arXiv:
- arXiv:1108.5897
- Bibcode:
- 2011PASJ...63S.713U
- Keywords:
-
- stars: flare;
- stars: individual (1RXS J104230.3-334014;
- TWA-7);
- stars: late-type;
- stars: pre-main-sequence;
- X-rays: stars;
- Astrophysics - High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena
- E-Print:
- 4 pages, 2 figures, 1 table accepted for publication in PASJ