XMM-Newton Studies of the Source Population and the Hot Interstellar Medium in Nearby Galaxies

Abstract

First results of X-ray source population studies in nearby galaxies show the potential of XMM-Newton observations. I will report on first XMM-Newton M31 results and on three of our XMM-Newton projects, an X-ray source population study in the Magellanic Clouds (MCs), a deep raster survey of M33, and an investigation of the hot interstellar medium (ISM) in the halo of edge-on galaxies. XMM-Newton results on several other galaxies and sources within are presented by other authors in these proceedings. Our MC study is build up of deep pointings probing MC sources down to 10^33 erg s^-1 and shallower pointings to confirm candidates from our ROSAT derived lists of X-ray binaries, super-soft sources, and supernova remnants. First XMM-Newton detections of a 455 s pulsar in the Small Magellanic Cloud and the results of the Large Magellanic Cloud deep field confirm the validity of our strategy. Our M33 raster pointing aims for luminosities as low as 10^35 erg s^-1, a factor of 10 below the sensitivity limit of the ROSAT observations. The survey will allow us to characterize the sources using extent, spectra, hardness ratios and time variability to build up an unprecedented census of the X-ray source content of M33. Of specific interest are the active source in the nuclear area and the diffuse emission in the inner disk. XMM-Newton observations of the active galaxy NGC 3079 and of the starburst galaxy NGC 253 are used to characterize the point-like sources and the hot ISM in the disk and from the halo of these galaxies.