TY  - JOUR
A1  - Bozzo, Enrico
A1  - Ferrigno, Carlo
A1  - Oskinova, Lida
A1  - Ducci, Lorenzo
T1  - Accretion of a clumped wind from a red supergiant donor on to a magnetar is suggested by the analysis of the XMM-Newton and NuSTAR observations of the X-ray binary 3A 1954+319
JF  - Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
N2  - 3A 1954+319 has been classified for a long time as a symbiotic X-ray binary, hosting a slowly rotating neutron star and an aged M red giant. Recently, this classification has been revised thanks to the discovery that the donor star is an M supergiant. This makes 3A 1954+319 a rare type of high-mass X-ray binary consisting of a neutron star and a red supergiant donor. In this paper, we analyse two archival and still unpublished XMM-Newton and NuSTAR observations of the source. We perform a detailed hardness ratio-resolved spectral analysis to search for spectral variability that could help investigating the structures of the inhomogeneous M supergiant wind from which the neutron star is accreting. We discuss our results in the context of wind-fed supergiant X-ray binaries and show that the newest findings on 3A 1954+319 reinforce the hypothesis that the neutron star in this system is endowed with a magnetar-like magnetic field strength (greater than or similar to 10(14) G).
KW  - accretion
KW  - stars: massive
KW  - stars: neutron
KW  - X-rays: binaries
KW  - X-rays: individual: 3A 1954+319
KW  - X-rays: stars
KW  - accretion discs
Y1  - 2021
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stab3688
SN  - 0035-8711
SN  - 1365-2966
VL  - 510
IS  - 3
SP  - 4645
EP  - 4653
PB  - Oxford Univ. Press
CY  - Oxford
ER  -