Subsecond periodic radio oscillations in a microquasar

Pengfu Tian; Ping Zhang; Wei Wang; Pei Wang; Xiaohui Sun; Jifeng Liu; Bing Zhang; Zigao Dai; Feng Yuan; Shuangnan Zhang; Qingzhong Liu; Peng Jiang; Xuefeng Wu; Zheng Zheng; Jiashi Chen; Di Li; Zonghong Zhu; Zhichen Pan; Hengqian Gan; Xiao Chen; Na Sai

doi:10.1038/s41586-023-06336-6

Subsecond periodic radio oscillations in a microquasar

Nature. 2023 Sep;621(7978):271-275. doi: 10.1038/s41586-023-06336-6. Epub 2023 Jul 26.

Authors

Pengfu Tian^#^{1

2}, Ping Zhang^#^{1

2}, Wei Wang^#^{3

4}, Pei Wang^#^{5

6}, Xiaohui Sun⁷, Jifeng Liu^{2

5}, Bing Zhang^{8

9}, Zigao Dai^{1

10}, Feng Yuan¹¹, Shuangnan Zhang¹², Qingzhong Liu¹³, Peng Jiang^{5

14}, Xuefeng Wu¹³, Zheng Zheng⁵, Jiashi Chen^{1

2}, Di Li^{5

15

16}, Zonghong Zhu^{1

17}, Zhichen Pan^{5

14}, Hengqian Gan^{5

14}, Xiao Chen^{1

2}, Na Sai^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Astronomy, School of Physics and Technology, Wuhan University, Wuhan, People's Republic of China.
² WHU-NAOC Joint Center for Astronomy, Wuhan University, Wuhan, People's Republic of China.
³ Department of Astronomy, School of Physics and Technology, Wuhan University, Wuhan, People's Republic of China. wangwei2017@whu.edu.cn.
⁴ WHU-NAOC Joint Center for Astronomy, Wuhan University, Wuhan, People's Republic of China. wangwei2017@whu.edu.cn.
⁵ National Astronomical Observatories, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, People's Republic of China.
⁶ Institute for Frontiers in Astronomy and Astrophysics, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, People's Republic of China.
⁷ School of Physics and Astronomy, Yunan University, Kunming, People's Republic of China.
⁸ Nevada Center for Astrophysics, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, NV, USA. bing.zhang@unlv.edu.
⁹ Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, NV, USA. bing.zhang@unlv.edu.
¹⁰ School of Astronomy and Space Science, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, People's Republic of China.
¹¹ Shanghai Astronomical Observatory, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, People's Republic of China.
¹² Key Laboratory of Particle Astrophysics, Institute of High Energy Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, People's Republic of China.
¹³ Purple Mountain Observatory, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Nanjing, People's Republic of China.
¹⁴ Guizhou Radio Astronomy Observatory, Guizhou University, Guiyang, People's Republic of China.
¹⁵ University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, People's Republic of China.
¹⁶ Zhijiang Lab, Hangzhou, Zhejiang, People's Republic of China.
¹⁷ Henan Academy of Sciences, Zhengzhou, People's Republic of China.

^# Contributed equally.

PMID: 37495697
DOI: 10.1038/s41586-023-06336-6

Abstract

Powerful relativistic jets are one of the ubiquitous features of accreting black holes in all scales^1-3. GRS 1915 + 105 is a well-known fast-spinning black-hole X-ray binary⁴ with a relativistic jet, termed a 'microquasar', as indicated by its superluminal motion of radio emission^5,6. It has exhibited persistent X-ray activity over the last 30 years, with quasiperiodic oscillations of approximately 1-10 Hz (refs. ^7-9) and 34 and 67 Hz in the X-ray band¹⁰. These oscillations probably originate in the inner accretion disk, but other origins have been considered¹¹. Radio observations found variable light curves with quasiperiodic flares or oscillations with periods of approximately 20-50 min (refs. ^12-14). Here we report two instances of approximately 5-Hz transient periodic oscillation features from the source detected in the 1.05- to 1.45-GHz radio band that occurred in January 2021 and June 2022. Circular polarization was also observed during the oscillation phase.