Searching for orbital period modulation in X-ray observations of the symbiotic X-ray binary GX 1+4

¹ Institut für Astronomie und Astrophysik, Sand 1, 72076 Tübingen, Germany
² ISDC Data Center for Astrophysics, Université de Genève, 16 chemin d’Écogia, 1290 Versoix, Switzerland
³ INAF – Osservatorio Astronomico di Brera, via Bianchi 46, 23807 Merate (LC), Italy

^⋆ Corresponding author; klawin@astro.uni-tuebingen.de

Received: 28 August 2024
Accepted: 2 October 2024

Abstract

The symbiotic X-ray binary GX 1+4 possesses a number of peculiar properties that have been studied since the early 1970s. In particular, the orbital period has been a point of debate for many years, until radial velocity measurements were able to settle the debate. These radial velocity findings have so far not been confirmed using X-ray data, even though multiple factors would cause a periodic variation on the same timescale as the orbital period at these energies. Because the orbit of GX 1+4 is eccentric and not seen face-on, changes in the accretion rate and column density along the line of sight could cause a periodic variation in the spin-frequency measurements, X-ray light curves, and hardness ratios of the source. Furthermore, for a high inclination of the orbital plane, the neutron star could be eclipsed by the companion, which would lead to periodic decreases in brightness. We used data from a number of different X-ray telescopes to search directly for periodicity by applying the Lomb-Scargle and epoch-folding approaches to long-term light-curve and spin-frequency measurement data of the source. We support our findings using folded light curves, hardness ratios, and images. We find that our results agree with the radial velocity findings, and we form a self-consistent model that is supported by folded hardness-ratios and light curves. We find that the source is clearly detected in X-rays during the predicted eclipse. Motivated by this absence of an eclipse in the system, we constrain the inclination of the system to ∼76° −84° and the mass of the neutron star in the system to ∼1.23 M_⊙ − 1.45 M_⊙ using the constraints on the red giant mass and surface gravity provided in the literature. Furthermore, we constrain the radius of the red giant to ∼60 R_⊙ − 150 R_⊙.