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Description
We present the X-ray point-source population in the nearby Virgo elliptical galaxy NGC 4636 from three Chandra X-ray observations. These observations, totaling ~193ks after time filtering, were taken with the Advanced CCD Imaging Camera (ACIS) over a three-year period. Using a wavelet decomposition detection algorithm, we detect 318 individual point sources. For our analysis, we use a subset of 277 detections with >=net 10 counts (a limiting luminosity of approximately 1.2x10^37^erg/s in the 0.5-2keV band, outside the central 1.5' bright galaxy core). We present a radial distribution of the point sources. Between 1.5' and 6' from the center, 25% of our sources are likely to be background sources (active galactic nuclei (AGNs)) and 75% are low-mass X-ray binaries (LMXBs) within the galaxy, while at radial distances greater than 6', background sources (AGN) will dominate the point sources. We find 77 matches between X-ray point sources and globular cluster (GC) candidates found in deep optical images of NGC 4636. In the annulus from 1.5' to 6' of the galaxy center, 48 of the 129 X-ray point sources (37%) with >=10 net counts are matched with GC candidates. Since we expect 25% of these sources to be background AGN, the percentage matched with GCs could be as high as 50%. Of these matched sources, we find that ~70% are associated with the redder GC candidates, those that are thought to have near-solar metal abundance.
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