An intermediate-mass black hole candidate in M51?

Abstract

We present the current results of an investigation into M51 ULX-7, using archival data from XMM-Newton, Chandra and NuSTAR, and optical and radio data from HST and VLA. The source has a consistently hard power-law X-ray spectrum and high short-term variability. This is unusual variability behaviour for a ULX, as we would expect highly variable ULXs to have soft energy spectra. The power spectrum features a break at ∼ 10^-3 Hz, from low frequency spectral index α=0.1 to high frequency spectral index α=0.8, analogous to the low frequency break found in power spectra of black holes accreting in the low/hard state. We do not observe a corresponding high frequency break, however taking the white noise level as a frequency lower limit of the break, we can calculate a black hole mass upper limit of 9.12×10⁴ M_⊙, assuming that the ULX is in the low/hard state. While there is no radio detection, we find a flux density upper limit of 87 μJy/beam. Using the X-ray/radio fundamental plane, we calculate a black hole mass upper limit of 1.95×10⁵ M_⊙. Therefore, this ULX is consistent with being an IMBH accreting in the low/hard state.