Complex UV/X-ray variability of 1H 0707-495
Abstract
We study the relationship between the UV and X-ray variability of the narrow-line Seyfert 1 galaxy 1H 0707-495. Using a year-long Swift monitoring and four long XMM-Newton observations, we perform cross-correlation analyses of the UV and X-ray light curves, on both long and short time-scales. We also perform time-resolved X-ray spectroscopy on 1-2 ks scale, and study the relationship between the UV emission and the X-ray spectral components - soft X-ray excess and a power law. We find that the UV and X-ray variations anticorrelate on short, and possibly on long time-scales as well. Our results rule out reprocessing as the dominant mechanism for the UV variability, as well as the inward propagating fluctuations in the accretion rate. Absence of a positive correlation between the photon index and the UV flux suggests that the observed UV emission is unlikely to be the seed photons for the thermal Comptonization. We find a strong correlation between the continuum flux and the soft-excess temperature which implies that the soft excess is most likely the reprocessed X-ray emission in the inner accretion disc. Strong X-ray heating of the innermost regions in the disc, due to gravitational light bending, appears to be an important effect in 1H 0707-495, giving rise to a significant fraction of the soft excess as reprocessed thermal emission. We also find indications for a non-static, dynamic X-ray corona, where either the size or height (or both) vary with time.
- Publication:
-
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
- Pub Date:
- December 2017
- DOI:
- 10.1093/mnras/stx2163
- arXiv:
- arXiv:1708.08664
- Bibcode:
- 2017MNRAS.472.2823P
- Keywords:
-
- galaxies: active;
- galaxies: individual: 1H 0707-495;
- galaxies: Seyfert;
- X-rays: galaxies;
- Astrophysics - High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena
- E-Print:
- 10 pages, 7 figures, Accepted to MNRAS