Speaker
Description
High-mass X-ray binaries (HMXB) represent an important evolutionary stage in lives of many massive stars. Significant fraction of HMXBs consists of a neutron star or a black hole deeply embedded in massive donor star wind and accreting its material. We have conducted a survey of HMXBs with the Hubble Space Telescope, and determined stellar wind parameters from measured UV and optical spectra. I will briefly review the main results of this observing campaign which question the leading models explaining different sub-types of HMXBs. I will also briefly review what recent X-ray observations of HMXBs reveal about the structure of donor stellar winds, stellar wind clumping, and large scale corotating interaction regions. Finally, new types of HMXBs with unusual X-ray properties will be presented. These exotic objects may represent still missing links in the evolution of massive binaries towards double degenerate binaries.
| Affiliation | Potsdam University |
|---|---|
| Topic | Compact and diffuse sources in galaxies and in the Galactic Center |
