Three new X-ray pulsars detected in the Small Magellanic Cloud and the positions of two other known pulsars determined

Abstract

Three new X-ray pulsars have been detected in the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) and the positions of two others have been determined, with archive Chandra data. A series of five observations of the SMC took place between 2002 May and October. Analysis of these data has revealed three previously unknown X-ray pulsars at pulse periods of 34, 503 and 138 s. The position of pulsar XTE J0052-725, which was originally detected by RXTE on 2002 June 19, was also accurately determined and a previously detected 7.78-s RXTE pulsar was identified as the source SMC X-3.