Hard X-ray Modulation Telescope

The Hard X-ray Modulation Telescope (HXMT) is China’s first X-ray astronomy satellite. It was originally proposed by Prof. Ti-Bei Li and Prof. Mei Wu based on their innovative Direct Demodulation image reconstruction method since the early 1990s, and was funded jointly by China National Space Administration (CNSA) and the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) in 2011.

Since the successful launch on June 15, 2017, HXMT was dubbed as "Insight-HXMT" and entered the 5-months commissioning operation phase. Now it is in the science operation phase.

Scientific objective

The main scientific objectives of Insight-HXMT are:

• To scan the Galactic Plane to find new transient sources and to monitor the known variable sources.
• To observe X-ray binaries to study the dynamics and emission mechanism in strong gravitational or magnetic fields.
• To find and study gamma-ray bursts with its anti-coi ncidence CsI detectors.

Fig. Illustration of Cyg X-1, the most famous black hole X-ray Binary, which is the main target of Insight-HXMT.

Fig. Illustration of pulsars, which are main targets of Insight-HXMT.

Fig. Illustration of Gamma-Ray Bursts (GRB), which are main targets of Insight-HXMT.

Payloads

Insight-HXMT consists of three main payloads: the High Energy X-ray telescope (HE, NaI/CsI, 20-250 keV, 5100 cm2), the Medium Energy X-ray telescope (ME, Si-PIN, 5-30 keV, 952 cm2), and the Low Energy X-ray telescope (LE, SCD, 1-15 keV, 384 cm2).

All these three telescopes employ slat collimator technique. Using the Direct Demodulation method and scanning observations, Insight-HXMT can localize celestial sources from X-rays to soft gamma-rays with high spatial resolution; meanwhile the large detection area of these telescopes also allows for pointed observations with high statistics and high Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR).

Insight-HXMT will discover a large number of new transient X-ray sources and will study the temporal and spectral properties of accreting black hole and neutron star systems in more details than the previous X-ray missions.