Science objectives of the Einstein Probe mission
Abstrak
The Einstein Probe (EP) is an interdisciplinary mission of time-domain and X-ray astronomy. Equipped with a wide-field lobster-eye X-ray focusing imager, EP will discover cosmic X-ray transients and monitor the X-ray variability of known sources in 0.5–4 keV, at a combination of detecting sensitivity and cadence that is not accessible to the previous and current wide-field monitoring missions. EP can perform quick characterisation of transients or outbursts with a Wolter-I X-ray telescope onboard. In this paper, the science objectives of the EP mission are presented. EP is expected to enlarge the sample of previously known or predicted but rare types of transients with a wide range of timescales. Among them, fast extragalactic transients will be surveyed systematically in soft X-rays, which include γ-ray bursts and their variants, supernova shock breakouts, and the predicted X-ray transients associated with binary neutron star mergers. EP will detect X-ray tidal disruption events and outbursts from active galactic nuclei, possibly at an early phase of the flares for some. EP will monitor the variability and outbursts of X-rays from white dwarfs, neutron stars and black holes in our and neighbouring galaxies at flux levels fainter than those detectable by the current instruments, and is expected to discover new objects. A large sample of stellar X-ray flares will also be detected and characterised. In the era of multi-messenger astronomy, EP has the potential of detecting the possible X-ray counterparts of gravitational wave events, neutrino sources, and ultra-high energy γ-ray and cosmic ray sources. EP is expected to help advance the studies of extreme objects and phenomena revealed in the dynamic X-ray universe, and their underlying physical processes. Besides EP’s strength in time-domain science, its follow-up telescope, with excellent performance, will also enable advances in many areas of X-ray astronomy.
Topik & Kata Kunci
Penulis (96)
W. Yuan
Lixin Dai
Hua Feng
C. Jin
P. Jonker
E. Kuulkers
Yuan Liu
Kirpal Nandra
P. O’Brien
L. Piro
A. Rau
N. Rea
J. Sanders
Lian Tao
Junfeng Wang
Xue-Hui Wu
Bing Zhang
Shuang-Nan Zhang
Shunke Ai
J. Buchner
E. Bulbul
Hechao Chen
Minghua Chen
Yong Chen
Yupeng Chen
A. Coleiro
F. Zelati
Zigao Dai
Xilong Fan
Zhou Fan
Susanne Friedrich
He Gao
Chong Ge
Mingyu Ge
Jinjun Geng
G. Ghirlanda
G. Gianfagna
Lijun Gou
S. Guillot
X. Hou
Jingwei Hu
Yongfeng Huang
Long Ji
Shumei Jia
S. Komossa
A. Kong
Lin Lan
An Li
An Li
Chengkui Li
Dongyue Li
Jian Li
Zhao-sheng Li
Z. Ling
Ang Liu
Jinzhong Liu
Lian-Lian Liu
Zhuo Liu
Jiawei Luo
R. Ma
P. Maggi
C. Maitra
A. Marino
S. Ng
Haiwu Pan
S. Rukdee
R. Soria
Hui Sun
P. Tam
A. L. Thakur
Huixian Tian
E. Troja
Wei Wang
Xiangyu Wang
Yanan Wang
Junjie Wei
Sixian Wen
Jianfeng Wu
Ting Wu
Di Xiao
Dong-Bei Xu
Re Xu
Yanjun Xu
Yu Xu
Hao Yang
Bei You
Heng Yu
Y. Yu
Binbin Zhang
Chen Zhang
Guobao Zhang
Liang Zhang
Wenda Zhang
Yu Zhang
Ping Zhou
Zecheng Zou
Akses Cepat
- Tahun Terbit
- 2025
- Bahasa
- en
- Total Sitasi
- 48×
- Sumber Database
- Semantic Scholar
- DOI
- 10.1007/s11433-024-2600-3
- Akses
- Open Access ✓