The ASTRO-H X-ray Observatory

Abstract

The joint JAXA/NASA ASTRO-H mission is the sixth in a series of highly successful X-ray missions initiated by the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS). ASTRO-H will investigate the physics of the highenergy universe via a suite of four instruments, covering a very wide energy range, from 0.3 keV to 600 keV. These instruments include a high-resolution, high-throughput spectrometer sensitive over 0.3-12 keV with high spectral resolution of ∆E ≦ 7 eV, enabled by a micro-calorimeter array located in the focal plane of thin-foil X-ray optics; hard X-ray imaging spectrometers covering 5-80 keV, located in the focal plane of multilayer-coated, focusing hard X-ray mirrors; a wide-field imaging spectrometer sensitive over 0.4-12 keV, with an X-ray CCD camera in the focal plane of a soft X-ray telescope; and a non-focusing Compton-camera type soft gamma-ray detector, sensitive in the 40-600 keV band. The simultaneous broad bandpass, coupled with high spectral resolution, will enable the pursuit of a wide variety of important science themes.

NuSTAR UNVEILS A COMPTON-THICK TYPE 2 QUASAR IN MrK 34

“…These issues can be investigated using higher spatial resolution imaging with Chandra and future high spectral resolution observations with Astro-H (Takahashi et al 2012). Figure 4 compares Mrk 34 on the L 2-10,in versus distance plane with all other bona fide CT AGNs from the compilation of Goulding et al (2012), supplemented with recent results on individual sources, which have been collated in the Appendix.…”

“…While the high EW Kα in Mrk 34 was known previously and gave a strong hint supporting CT obscuration, the detection and identification of this narrow feature require a reasonable count rate, which is not available for most AGNs found in typical distant X-ray surveys. Expanded deep surveys with Chandra and XMM-Newton (e.g., the upcoming 7 Ms Chandra Deep Field South) will help in this regard, as will detailed follow-up with future missions such as Astro-H and Athena (Takahashi et al 2012;Nandra et al 2013). …”

A White Paper on keV sterile neutrino Dark Matter

“…By the beginning of 2016, the forthcoming Astro-H [864] mission and the planned Micro-X sounding rocket experiment [865] were expected have sufficient spectral resolution to resolve the line against other nearby features and to detect the candidate line in the "strong line" regime [602]. In particular, the general hope was Astro-H should be able to resolve the Milky Way halo's DM decay signal and therefore all its observations can be used, which unfortunately did not happen -see paragraph below.…”

“…We give explicit numbers for (a) small experiment which could be realized within a few years and (b) an ambitious experiment aimed at approaching astrophysically-motivated mixing angles. the X-ray energy, for X-rays emitted in the rest frame of the sterile neutrino, and the energy resolutions achieved with X-ray observatories based on the TES-technology are typically a few eV [916]. This study investigates an approach to fit the tritium spectrum that can yield high sensitivity to low active-sterile mixing angles across a broad range of keV-scale sterile neutrino masses.…”

Studies of the moisture absorption of thin carbon fiber reinforced plastic substrates for x-ray mirrors

“…3 These telescopes have high angular resolution of several or sub arc seconds, but they require a large diameter to have a large effective area because the thick substrate causes a dead area in the mirror. On the other hand, mirrors with large effective areas are formed by nested thin substrates made of aluminum foil and are mounted on Japanese x-ray observatories, such as ASCA, 4 Suzaku, 5 and ASTRO-H. 6,7 These telescopes have higher collecting area to weight ratios than other x-ray telescope designs, but the angular resolution of the telescopes is limited to ∼1 arc min. This limitation is caused, in part, by the approximate conical shape of the Wolter-I optics (paraboloid and hyperboloid), the positional error between the two stage mirrors, and deformation of the substrate itself.…”