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J.S. Warren, J.P. Hughes (Rutgers University), P. Slane (SAO), D. Burrows, J. Nousek (Penn State)
We present {\em Chandra} X-ray observations of the supernova remnant (SNR) N63A in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). N63A is one of the brightest LMC remnants and appears to be embedded in an H {\sc ii} region. It consists of three lobes of optical emission contained within the much larger X-ray remnant. Our {\em Chandra} data reveal a number of new features in the X-ray remnant. First we note the presence of several "bow shock" features located beyond the main shell that resemble similar features seen in the Vela SNR by {\em ROSAT}. Another obvious feature of the remnant is a roughly triangular "hole" in the X-ray emission near the location of the optical lobes. This deficit of emission arises from absorption by an intervening cloud with a mass of ~600 M\odot. We also find that the rim of the remnant has a considerably different spectral character from the rest, showing softer X-ray emission than the interior. In this paper we will present the general technique we have developed to examine spectral variations across the remnant based on comparing the spectra of many individual small spatial regions to the integrated spectrum of the whole remnant. We will also report on the nature of the new features found in N63A based on study of their X-ray spectral characteristics.
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Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 34
© 2002. The American Astronomical Soceity.