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Spectral Models

 

As mentioned above there are two kinds of models:

  1. those which describe the physical process of the radiating source:

    displaymath17963

    They have the dimension of a monochromatic photon flux, which -- in this package -- is always measured in units of photons/cm tex2html_wrap_inline17965 /s/keV. These models have to be handled additively.        

  2. those which describe the photoelectric absorption between source and detector:

    displaymath17967

    They are filter like functions with a range of unitless values between 0 and 1 and have to be used multiplicatively. If a filter function describes the galactic absorption a given red shift is ignored.        

With these definitions a more general model f(E;p) can be constructed by adding and multiplying appropriate model components, as e.g.:

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where different parameter lists tex2html_wrap_inline17973 are allowed to overlap.

Throughout this package a unit system of cm, s, and keV with a Boltzmann constant of tex2html_wrap_inline17975 is used. This means that temperatures are measured in keV. They can be transformed into degrees of Kelvin by multiplying their values with the inverse of the Boltzmann constant     1.1604... tex2html_wrap_inline17977 10 tex2html_wrap_inline17979 Kelvin/keV.

The normalization amplitude of a spectral model function, which cannot be normalized, is taken at a certain reference energy tex2html_wrap_inline17981 , which can be chosen. The default value of this reference energy is tex2html_wrap_inline17983 = 1keV. In all other cases the model function is normalized to 1, so that the normalization amplitude A represents the whole integral of the model spectrum measured in a unit photons/cm tex2html_wrap_inline17985 /s. Exceptions are thermal plasma line spectra [Raymond and Smith1977, Kaastra and Mewe1993] where the normalization is related to the emission measure.  

In the following some standard models are described. Most of them are created in a parameter file with the command CREATE/PARFIL fit <par_file_name>, where they can be edited and combined in a proper way to a more complex model (making also use of the command WRITE/PARFIL.




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Next: Source Models (additive) Up: 6.3 Commands and Parameter Previous: Multiplicative Models

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