• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.36 no.1
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• pp.35.1-35.1
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• 2011

The solar X-ray telescopes, the Yohkoh SXT and the Hinode XRT, have observed for a couple of decades a variety of coronal structures in the range of wide field-of-view (FOV) covering the full solar disk. It has been emphasized that the optical structure of solar telescopes should be designed with care for improving the uniformity over the full FOV. The vignetting effect is one of the important optical characteristics for describing the performance of a telescope, which reflects the ability of collecting the incoming light at different locations and different photon energies. The correction of this vignetting effect would be an important calibration step that should be performed in advance, especially when the observed images are to be used for photometric purposes. Since the vignetting effect of solar X-ray telescopes shows wavelength dependence, a special care should be taken when, for example, performing the temperature analyses with thin and thick filters for flaring activities observed at the periphery of the full FOV. The results of analysis of pre-launch calibration data for the evaluation of vignetting effect will be introduced in detail.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.36 no.2
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• pp.87.1-87.1
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• 2011

Since early 90's, the solar X-ray telescopes such as Yohkoh SXT and Hinode XRT have observed coronal magnetic structures on the Sun's surface in the range of about $40'{\times}40'$ field-of-view (FOV) covering the full solar disk. Thus it has been stressed by the scientists that the optical structure of solar telescopes should be designed with care for improving the uniformity over a wide FOV. There would be, however, no unique solution in designing the optical system of a telescope for overcoming perfectly the problem of off-axis response variation. As a consequence, the correction of optical imperfectness of telescopes has become an important calibration step that should be performed beforehand when the observed images are to be used for photometric purposes. In particular, a special care should be taken when performing the temperature analysis with thin and thick filters for flaring activities observed at the periphery of the full FOV. From the analyses of both pre-launch calibration and in-flight observation data, the optical characteristics for describing the performance of solar X-ray telescopes, especially in view of their energy dependence, will be introduced and discussed in our presentation.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.35 no.3
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• pp.133-141
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• 2018

We report on our Galactic plane searches for magnetars in the archival Chandra X-ray Observatory (CXO) data. We summarize the properties of known magnetars and use them to establish a procedure for magnetar searches. The procedure includes four steps: source finding, spectral characterization, optical counterpart checks, and period searches. We searched 1,282 archival CXO observations, found 32,838 X-ray sources, and selected 25 intriguing candidates using the developed procedure. Although we do not firmly identify a magnetar among them, we significantly reduced the number of targets in future magnetar searches to be done with better X-ray telescopes.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.43 no.2
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• pp.43.1-43.1
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• 2018

Young pulsar wind nebulae, powered by energetic central pulsars, are often observed as bright extended sources in the X-ray band. They are believed to accelerate electrons and positrons to very high energy and can possibly explain the positron excess observed by Fermi and AMS. The electron distribution in these PWNe can be best studied by X-ray satellites because emission in the X-ray band is produced by direct synchrotron radiation of the electrons and positrons. We present NuSTAR studies of PWNe and discuss the implication. Future studies to help further our understanding of particle acceleration will be briefly discussed.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.35 no.2
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• pp.33.2-33.2
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• 2010

Galaxy clusters are known to be very bright in X-ray and contain a large number of X-ray point sources within the X-ray emission. However, due to the fluctuations of the X-ray emission, it is very difficult to detect faint X-ray sources and to extract accurately the photometric properties of the X-ray point sources in galaxy clusters. In addition, the most X-ray telescopes show spatially varying point spread function (PSF) and suffer from severe vignetting. The Chandra Archival Survey of Galaxy Clusters project is a wide-area ($\sim40deg^2$) survey of serendipitous Chandra X-ray sources in galaxy cluster fields, containing ~58,000 X-ray point sources in ~800 Chandra ACIS observations of ~600 galaxy clusters. This project aim to investigate the density environmental effects on the physical properties of the X-ray point sources, comparing physical properties of the X-ray point sources in galaxy clusters to those in typical fields. To utilize the sensitivity and detection probability of the X-ray point sources in galaxy clusters, we perform extensive Monte-Carlo simulations. In this poster, we compare the detection probability of the X-ray point sources in galaxy clusters to that of typical fields, and discuss quantitatively the difference between them.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.42 no.2
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• pp.65.5-66
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• 2017

In the history of astronomy, observed data were interpreted very frequently based upon data measured at laboratories. For example, all the spectroscopic observations were understood via spectroscopic measurements on nuclei, atoms, and molecules. Recently, computational astrophysics plays a role of bridging experimental data to observations, in particular via numerical modeling of complex astronomical phenomena. This presentation focuses on computational nuclear astrophysics that connects experimental data on nuclei to high-energy observation data obtained by X-ray and gamma-ray telescopes. As an example case, X-ray burst will be discussed. In this phenomenon, observed X-ray light curves and spectra can be modeled by stellar evolution calculations that take nuclear reactions of rare isotopes as input information. This presentation also works as an introduction to the following presentation that will provide more detailed discussion on the experimental aspect of X-ray burst.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.43 no.2
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• pp.32.4-33
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• 2018

We present the BAT AGN Spectroscopic Survey (BASS) which is an optical/NIR spectroscopic survey of the least biased sample of hard X-ray selected local AGN. For more than a thousand AGN that identified through Swift-BAT hard X-ray all-sky survey, we are conducting dedicated spectroscopic observing runs using world-class telescopes such as ESO-VLT, Magellan, and Palomar. The goal of the project is measuring black hole mass, investigating supermassive blackhole growth and its structure, and providing a baseline for future X-ray missions that will perform deeper observations of more distant AGN. In this presentation, we briefly introduce the concept of the project, past and the current status, and future work.

• Current Optics and Photonics
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.9-15
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• 2020

Fresnel zone plates have been widely used in many applications, such as x-ray telescopes, microfluorescence, and microimaging. To obtain an x-ray Fresnel zone plate, many fabrication methods, such as electron-beam etching, ion-beam etching and chemical etching, have been developed. Fresnel zone plates fabricated by these methods will inevitably lead to some nonideal factors, which have an impact on the focusing characteristics of the zone plate. In this paper, the influences of these nonideal factors on the focusing characteristics of the zone plate are studied systematically, by numerical simulations based on scalar diffraction theory. The influence of the thickness of a Fresnel zone plate on the absolute focusing efficiency is calculated for a given incident x-ray's wavelength. The diffraction efficiency and size of the focal spot are calculated for different incline angles of the groove. The simulations of zone plates without struts, with regular struts, and with random struts are carried out, to study the effects of struts on the focusing characteristics of a zone plate. When a Fresnel zone plate is used to focus an ultrashort x-ray pulse, the effect of zone-plate structure on the final pulse duration is also discussed.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.37 no.2
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• pp.66-66
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• 2012

We describe the space project of Ultra-Fast Flash Observatory (UFFO), which will observe early optical photons from gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) with a sub-second optical response, for the first time. The UFFO will probe the early optical rise of GRBs, opening a completely new frontier in GRB and transient studies, using a fast-response rotatable mirror system which redirects opitical path to telescope instead of slewing of telescopes or spacecraft. In our small UFFO-Pathfinder experiment, scheduled to launch aboard the Lomonosov satellite in June 2012, we use a motorized mirror in our Slewing Mirror Telescope instrument to achieve less than one second optical response after X-ray trigger. We describe the science and the mission of the UFFO project, including a serious version called UFFO-100 which will be launched in 2014. With our program of ultra-fast optical response GRB observatories, we aim to gain a deeper understanding of GRB mechanisms, and potentially open up the z>10 universe to study via GRB as point source emission probes.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.51-55
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• 2012

A few high-mass X-ray binaries-consisting of an OB star plus compact companion-have been observed by Fermi and ground-based Cerenkov telescopes like High Energy Stereoscopic System (HESS) to be sources of very high energy (VHE; up to 30 TeV) ${\gamma}$-rays. This paper focuses on the prominent ${\gamma}$-ray source, LS 5039, which consists of a massive O6.5V star in a 3.9-day-period, mildly elliptical ($e{\approx}0.24$) orbit with its companion, assumed here to be an unmagnetized compact object (e.g., black hole). Using three dimensional smoothed particle hydrodynamics simulations of the Bondi-Hoyle accretion of the O-star wind onto the companion, we find that the orbital phase variation of the accretion follows very closely the simple Bondi-Hoyle-Lyttleton (BHL) rate for the local radius and wind speed. Moreover, a simple model, wherein intrinsic emission of ${\gamma}$-rays is assumed to track this accretion rate, reproduces quite well Fermi observations of the phase variation of ${\gamma}$-rays in the energy range 0.1-10 GeV. However for the VHE (0.1-30 TeV) radiation observed by the HESS Cerenkov telescope, it is important to account also for photon-photon interactions between the ${\gamma}$-rays and the stellar optical/UV radiation, which effectively attenuates much of the strong emission near periastron. When this is included, we find that this simple BHL accretion model also quite naturally fits the HESS light curve, thus making it a strong alternative to the pulsar-wind-shock models commonly invoked to explain such VHE ${\gamma}$-ray emission in massive-star binaries.