Yutaro Sekimoto

Hard X-Ray Emission from the Galactic Ridge

Hard X-ray and γ-ray emissions from the Galactic ridge were studied with the large area proportional counter (LAC) on the Ginga satellite and a balloon-borne detector Welcome-1. In the scanning observations with the LAC, diffuse hard X-rays were detected along the Galactic plane between l = -20° and l = 40°. The measured spectrum shows that a hard component exists in the Galactic ridge emission above 10 keV, in addition to the hot plasma component. The estimated luminosity of the Galactic ridge emission is around 2 × 1038 ergs s-1 in the 3-16 keV band. Welcome-1 observed the γ-ray ridge emission at around l ~ 345° between 50 and 600 keV. These two results and a recent COMPTEL study suggest that the spectrum of the diffuse Galactic ridge emission extends over the keV-MeV range. From the observed spectral slope, bremsstrahlung by electrons is shown to be the dominant emission mechanism. This implies that low-energy electrons must be supplied continuously to sustain emission in the hard X-ray band. We propose a scenario in which the thermal electrons in the hot plasma responsible for the strong Fe K X-ray emission are shock-accelerated continuously in supernova remnants (SNRs), producing the observed hard X-ray and γ-ray emissions from the Galactic ridge.

Discovery of X-Rays from Class 0 Protostar Candidates in OMC-3

We have observed the Orion Molecular Clouds 2 and 3 (OMC-2 and OMC-3) with the Chandra X-Ray Observatory (CXO). The northern part of OMC-3 is found to be particularly rich in new X-ray features; four hard X-ray sources are located in and along the filament of cloud cores. Two sources coincide positionally with the submillimeter-millimeter dust condensations of MMS 2 and 3 or an outflow radio source VLA 1, which are in a very early phase of star formation. The X-ray spectra of these sources show an absorption column of (1-3) × 1023 H cm-2. Assuming a moderate temperature plasma, the X-ray luminosity in the 0.5-10 keV band is estimated to be ~1030 ergs s-1 at a distance of 450 pc. From the large absorption, positional coincidence, and moderate luminosity, we infer that the hard X-rays are coming from very young stellar objects embedded in the molecular cloud cores.We found another hard X-ray source near the edge of the dust filament. The extremely high absorption of 3 × 1023 H cm-2 indicates that the source must be surrounded by dense gas, suggesting that it is either a young stellar object in an early accretion phase or a Type II AGN (e.g., a Seyfert 2), although no counterpart is found at any other wavelength. In contrast to the hard X-ray sources, soft X-ray sources are found spread around the dust filaments, most of which are identified with IR sources in the T Tauri phase.

Well-type phoswich counter for low-flux X-ray/ gamma -ray detection

Novel phoswich counters have been developed that are capable of detecting low flux hard X-rays gamma -rays from localized sources. The counter consists of a small inorganic scintillator with a fast decay time (the detection part) glued to the interior bottom surface of a well-shaped block of another inorganic scintillator with a slow decay time (the shielding part). The well-shaped shielding part acts as an active collimator as well as an active shield. The whole assembly is viewed by a phototube from the exterior bottom surface of the shielding part. By using an appropriate pulse-shape discriminator, hard X-rays/ gamma -rays that have deposited energy only in the detection part can be selected. The first model counter was built by using a new scintillator, GSO, in the detection part and CsI(Tl) in the shielding part. A detector system consisting of 64 such phoswich counters (total area approximately 740 cm/sup 2/) was flown on board a balloon, setting a limit to the /sup 57/Co line flux from SN 1987A at around 10/sup -4//cm/sup 2/-s. The sensitivity for continuum flux was around a few*10/sup -6//cm/sup 2/-s-keV between 100 and 200 keV. >

LiteBIRD: a small satellite for the study of B-mode polarization and inflation from cosmic background radiation detection

LiteBIRD [Lite (Light) satellite for the studies of B-mode polarization and Inflation from cosmic background Radiation Detection] is a small satellite to map the polarization of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation over the full sky at large angular scales with unprecedented precision. Cosmological inflation, which is the leading hypothesis to resolve the problems in the Big Bang theory, predicts that primordial gravitational waves were created during the inflationary era. Measurements of polarization of the CMB radiation are known as the best probe to detect the primordial gravitational waves. The LiteBIRD working group is authorized by the Japanese Steering Committee for Space Science (SCSS) and is supported by JAXA. It has more than 50 members from Japan, USA and Canada. The scientific objective of LiteBIRD is to test all the representative inflation models that satisfy single-field slow-roll conditions and lie in the large-field regime. To this end, the requirement on the precision of the tensor-to-scalar ratio, r, at LiteBIRD is equal to or less than 0.001. Our baseline design adopts an array of multi-chroic superconducting polarimeters that are read out with high multiplexing factors in the frequency domain for a compact focal plane. The required sensitivity of 1.8μKarcmin is achieved with 2000 TES bolometers at 100mK. The cryogenic system is based on the Stirling/JT technology developed for SPICA, and the continuous ADR system shares the design with future X-ray satellites.

Investigation of Diffuse Hard X-Ray Emission from the Massive Star-forming Region NGC 6334

Chandra ACIS-I data of the molecular cloud and H II region complex NGC 6334 were analyzed. The hard X-ray clumps detected with ASCA (Sekimoto and coworkers) were resolved into 792 point sources. After removing the point sources, an extended X-ray emission component was detected over a 5 × 9 pc2 region, with the 0.5-8 keV absorption-corrected luminosity of 2 × 1033 ergs s-1. The contribution from faint point sources to this extended emission was estimated as at most ~20%, suggesting that most of the emission is diffuse in nature. The X-ray spectrum of the diffuse emission was observed to vary from place to place. In tenuous molecular cloud regions with hydrogen column density of (0.5-1) × 1022 cm-2, the spectrum can be represented by a thermal plasma model with temperatures of several keV. The spectrum in dense cloud cores exhibits harder continuum, together with higher absorption of more than ~3 × 1022 cm-2. In some of such highly obscured regions, the spectra show extremely hard continua equivalent to a photon index of ~1, and favor a nonthermal interpretation. These results are discussed in the context of thermal and nonthermal emission, both powered by fast stellar winds from embedded young early-type stars through shock transitions.

Atomic carbon and CO isotope emission in the vicinity of DR 15

We present observations of the P-3(1)-P-3(o) fine-structure transition of atomic carbon [C I], the J = 3-2 transition of CO, and the J = 1-0 transitions of (CO)-C-13 and (CO)-O-18 toward DR 15, an H II region associated with two mid-infrared dark clouds (IRDCs). The (CO)-C-13 and (CO)-O-18 J = 1-0 emissions closely follow the dark patches seen in optical wavelength, showing two self-gravitating molecular cores with masses of 2000 and 900 M-circle dot, respectively, at the positions of the cataloged IRDCs. Our data show a rough spatial correlation between [C I] and (CO)-C-13 J = 1-0. Bright [C I] emission occurs in the relatively cold gas behind the molecular cores but does not occur in either highly excited gas traced by CO J = 3-2 emission or in the H II region/molecular cloud interface. These results are inconsistent with those predicted by standard photodissociation region models, suggesting an origin for interstellar atomic carbon unrelated to photodissociation processes.

ALMA front-end optics

The ALMA telescope will be an interferometer of 64 antennas, which will be situated in the Atacama desert in Chile. Each antenna will have receivers that cover the frequencies 30 GHz to 970 GHZ. This frequency range is divided into 10 frequency bands. All of these receiver bands are fitted on a cartridge and cooled, with bands 1 and 2 at 15K and the other 8 are SIS receivers at a temperature of 4K. Each band has a dual polarization receiver. The optics has been designed so that the maximum of the optics is cooled to minimize the noise temperature increase to the receivers. The design of the optics will be shown for each frequency bands. Test results with the method of testing on a near field amplitude and phase measurement system will be given for the first 4 frequency bands to be used, which are bands 3 (84-116 GHz), 6 (211-275GHz), 7 (275-375 GHz and 9 (600-702 GHz). These measurements will be compared with physical optics calculations.

Molecular Outflows from X-Ray-Emitting Protostars in the ρ Ophiuchi Dark Cloud

We report CO (J = 2-1, J = 1-0) outflows from four X-ray-emitting protostars (EL29, IRS44, WL6, WL10) in the ρ Ophiuchi cloud core which have been firmly identified with the X-ray satellite ASCA. The common feature of these outflows is that the blue and red lobes are largely overlapped, which indicates that the inclination angle between the outflow axis and line of sight is smaller than 30° (nearly pole-on configuration). Taking account of the hard X-ray transparency (NH ~ 1023 cm-2) and the column density of a circumstellar disk (NH > 1024 cm-2), it is naturally understood that hard X-rays emitted near the surface of protostars or the inner part of the disk are observed in the nearly pole-on configuration. The outflow detection rate (4/5) in the present observations shows that a low-mass protostar emits X-rays even in the outflow phase of early stellar evolution.

Distribution of the [C I] Emission in the ρ Ophiuchi Dark Cloud

The 3P1-3P0 fine-structure line of the neutral carbon atom ([C I]) has been mapped over the 18 × 13 area of the L1688 cloud in the ρ Ophiuchi region with the Mount Fuji submillimeter-wave telescope. The 3P2-3P1 line of [C I] has also been observed toward two representative positions to evaluate the excitation temperature of the [C I] lines. The overall extent of the [C I] distribution generally resembles that of the 13CO distribution. The [C I] distribution has two major peaks; one (peak I) is at ρ Oph A, and the other (peak II) is toward the east side of the C18O core in the southern part of L1688. Peak II is located beyond the C18O core with respect to the exciting star HD 147889. The C0 column density is 5.0 × 1017 cm-2 toward peak II. The spatial distribution of the [C I] emission is compared with plane-parallel photodissociation region (PDR) models, which suggest that peak II is associated with a lower density PDR front, adjacent to the dense cloud cores observed in the C18O line emission. Alternatively, peak II is in the early stage of chemical evolution, where C0 has not been completely converted to CO. In this case, the difference in the [C I] and C18O distributions represents an evolutionary sequence. This is consistent with a picture of a shock-compressed formation of the dense cores in this region due to influences from the Sco OB2 association.

W-band waveguide photomixer using a uni-traveling-carrier photodiode with 2-mW output

Developed a W-band (75-110 GHz) waveguide photomixer with a uni-traveling carrier photodiode, which can be driven by two 1.5-/spl mu/m lasers. It generates an output power of 2.2/spl plusmn/0.2 mW at 100 GHz with a laser power of less than 100 mW, and its relative power variation is as small as 3 dB across the entire frequency range of the W-band. A 100-GHz superconductor-insulator-superconductor receiver driven by this photomixer shows the same noise temperature around 26 K as that driven by a conventional Gunn oscillator.