TY - JOUR A1 - Martinez-Nunez, Silvia A1 - Kretschmar, Peter A1 - Bozzo, Enrico A1 - Oskinova, Lidia M. A1 - Puls, Joachim A1 - Sidoli, Lara A1 - Sundqvist, Jon Olof A1 - Blay, Pere A1 - Falanga, Maurizio A1 - Furst, Felix A1 - Gimenez-Garcia, Angel A1 - Kreykenbohm, Ingo A1 - Kuehnel, Matthias A1 - Sander, Andreas Alexander Christoph A1 - Torrejon, Jose Miguel A1 - Wilms, Joern T1 - Towards a Unified View of Inhomogeneous Stellar Winds in Isolated Supergiant Stars and Supergiant High Mass X-Ray Binaries JF - Space science reviews N2 - Massive stars, at least similar to 10 times more massive than the Sun, have two key properties that make them the main drivers of evolution of star clusters, galaxies, and the Universe as a whole. On the one hand, the outer layers of massive stars are so hot that they produce most of the ionizing ultraviolet radiation of galaxies; in fact, the first massive stars helped to re-ionize the Universe after its Dark Ages. Another important property of massive stars are the strong stellar winds and outflows they produce. This mass loss, and finally the explosion of a massive star as a supernova or a gamma-ray burst, provide a significant input of mechanical and radiative energy into the interstellar space. These two properties together make massive stars one of the most important cosmic engines: they trigger the star formation and enrich the interstellar medium with heavy elements, that ultimately leads to formation of Earth-like rocky planets and the development of complex life. The study of massive star winds is thus a truly multidisciplinary field and has a wide impact on different areas of astronomy. In recent years observational and theoretical evidences have been growing that these winds are not smooth and homogeneous as previously assumed, but rather populated by dense "clumps". The presence of these structures dramatically affects the mass loss rates derived from the study of stellar winds. Clump properties in isolated stars are nowadays inferred mostly through indirect methods (i.e., spectroscopic observations of line profiles in various wavelength regimes, and their analysis based on tailored, inhomogeneous wind models). The limited characterization of the clump physical properties (mass, size) obtained so far have led to large uncertainties in the mass loss rates from massive stars. Such uncertainties limit our understanding of the role of massive star winds in galactic and cosmic evolution. Supergiant high mass X-ray binaries (SgXBs) are among the brightest X-ray sources in the sky. A large number of them consist of a neutron star accreting from the wind of a massive companion and producing a powerful X-ray source. The characteristics of the stellar wind together with the complex interactions between the compact object and the donor star determine the observed X-ray output from all these systems. Consequently, the use of SgXBs for studies of massive stars is only possible when the physics of the stellar winds, the compact objects, and accretion mechanisms are combined together and confronted with observations. This detailed review summarises the current knowledge on the theory and observations of winds from massive stars, as well as on observations and accretion processes in wind-fed high mass X-ray binaries. The aim is to combine in the near future all available theoretical diagnostics and observational measurements to achieve a unified picture of massive star winds in isolated objects and in binary systems. KW - Massive stars KW - Stellar outflows KW - X-ray binary KW - Wind-fed systems KW - Accretion processes KW - SgXBs KW - SFXTs Y1 - 2017 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1007/s11214-017-0340-1 SN - 0038-6308 SN - 1572-9672 VL - 212 SP - 59 EP - 150 PB - Springer CY - Dordrecht ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Sidoli, Lara A1 - Sguera, Vito A1 - Esposito, Paolo A1 - Oskinova, Lidia M. A1 - Polletta, Maria del Carmen T1 - XMM-Newton discovery of very high obscuration in the candidate Supergiant Fast X-ray Transient AX J1714.1-3912 JF - Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society N2 - We have analysed an archival XMM-Newton EPIC observation that serendipitously covered the sky position of a variable X-ray source AX J1714.1-3912, previously suggested to be a Supergiant Fast X-ray Transient (SFXT). During the XMM-Newton observation the source is variable on a timescale of hundred seconds and shows two luminosity states, with a flaring activity followed by unflared emission, with a variability amplitude of a factor of about 50. We have discovered an intense iron emission line with a centroid energy of 6.4 keV in the power law-like spectrum, modified by a large absorption (N-H similar to 10(24) cm(-2)), never observed before from this source. This X-ray spectrum is unusual for an SFXT, but resembles the so-called 'highly obscured sources', high mass X-ray binaries (HMXBs) hosting an evolved B[e] supergiant companion (sgB[e]). This might suggest that AX J1714.1-3912 is a new member of this rare type of HMXBs, which includes IGR J16318-4848 and CI Camelopardalis. Increasing this small population of sources would be remarkable, as they represent an interesting short transition evolutionary stage in the evolution of massive binaries. Nevertheless, AX J1714.1-3912 appears to share X-ray properties of both kinds of HMXBs (SFXT versus sgB[e] HMXB). Therefore, further investigations of the companion star are needed to disentangle the two hypothesis. KW - X-rays: binaries KW - X-rays: individual: AX J1714.1-3912 Y1 - 2022 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stac691 SN - 0035-8711 SN - 1365-2966 VL - 512 IS - 2 SP - 2929 EP - 2935 PB - Oxford Univ. Press CY - Oxford ER -