出版社：SISSA, Scuola Internazionale Superiore di Studi Avanzati
摘要：The recent claim of broad skewed iron lines from neutron star (NS) low-mass X-ray binaries (LMXBs) has opened the exciting possibility of determining an upper limit to the radius of the NS, the most difficult parameter to obtain in order to constrain their equation of state. With the aim of studying further this possibility, we performed a systematic analysis of XMM-Newton archival observations of 16 bright NS LMXBs. We performed a detailed data analysis taking into account the systematic effects that arise as a consequence of the high count rates present in the observations of these sources. The properties of the Fe lines differed from previous published analyses due to either different pile-up corrections or continuum parameterisation. Most importantly, we could fit the Fe line with a simple Gaussian component for all the sources in the sample. The lines did not show the asymmetric profiles that were interpreted as an indication of relativistic effects in previous analyses of these LMXBs. We summarise here the results of the outlined study (for details, see [19]) and discuss the implications of these results for studies of broad Fe lines in LMXBs with current and future missions.
