DAPNIA-04-46 |
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Detection of Hard X-rays from the Galactic Nuclear Region with INTEGRAL |
G. Belanger et al. |
This Letter presents the first results of an observational campaign to study the Galactic center with INTEGRAL, the Internaltional Gamma-Ray Astrophysics Laboratory. Mosaicked images were constructed using data obtained with ISGRI, the soft gamma-ray instrument of the coded aperture IBIS imager, in the energy ranges 20--40 and 40--100 keV. These give a yet unseen view of the high-energy sources of this region in hard X-rays and gamma-rays with an angular resolution of 12\\am (FWHM). We report on the discovery of a source, IGR J1745.6--2901, coincident with the Galactic nucleus \\sgra to within 0.9 arcminutes. Located at R.A.(J2000.0) = 17h45m38.5s, decl.(J2000.0) = -29deg01\'15\'\', the source is visible up to about 100 keV with a 20--100 keV luminosity at 8 kpc of (2.89 \\pm 0.41) \\times 10^{35} ergs/s. Although the new INTEGRAL source cannot unequivocally be associated to the Galactic nucleus, this is the first report of significant hard X-ray emission from within the inner 10\' of the Galaxy and a contribution from the Galactic supermassive black hole itself cannot be excluded. |