Bibcode
Shahbaz, T.; Naylor, T.; Charles, P. A.
Referencia bibliográfica
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Volume 285, Issue 3, pp. 607-612.
Advertised on:
3
1997
Número de citas
48
Número de citas referidas
39
Descripción
We have obtained an H-band infrared light curve of the low-mass X-ray
binary transient Nova Muscae 1991. We model the light curve as being due
to the tidal distortion of the secondary star in the gravitational field
of a black hole, and thus deduce the binary inclination to be 54 deg,
with 90 per cent confidence limits of +20 deg/-15 deg. Combining this
with previously published spectroscopic data, we determine the mass of
the black hole to be in the range 4-11Msolar (90 per cent confidence).
Using Bailey's relation and our estimates of the radius of the secondary
star, we obtain a 90 per cent lower limit to distance of 2.8kpc and a
firm upper limit of 4.0kpc.