Energy dependence of normal branch oscillations in Scorpius X-1

¹ Institute of Astronomy, National Tsing Hua University, 30013 Hsinchu, Taiwan
e-mail: jwang@mx.nthu.edu.tw
² Department of Physics, National Tsing Hua University, 30013 Hsinchu, Taiwan
³ LESIA, Paris Observatory, 92195 Meudon, France

Received: 17 July 2012
Accepted: 5 October 2012

Abstract

We report the energy dependence of normal branch oscillations (NBOs) in Scorpius X-1, a low-mass X-ray binary Z-source. Three characteristic quantities (centroid frequency, quality factor, and fractional root-mean-squared (rms) amplitude) of a quasi-periodic oscillation signal as functions of photon energy are investigated. We found that, although it is not yet statistically well established, there is a signature indicating that the NBO centroid frequency decreases with increasing photon energy when it is below 6−8 keV, which turns out to be positively correlated with the photon energy at the higher energy side. In addition, the rms amplitude increases significantly with the photon energy below 13 keV and then decreases in the energy band of 13−20 keV. There is no clear dependence on photon energy for the quality factor. Based on these results, we suggest that the NBO originates mainly in the transition layer.