The slow heartbeats of an ultra-luminous X-ray source in NGC 3621

S. E. Motta, M. Marelli, F. Pintore, P. Esposito, R. Salvaterra, A. De Luca, G. L. Israel, A. Tiengo, G. A. Rodríguez Castillo

Published 2020-06-09Version 1

We report on the results of X-ray observations of 4XMM J111816.0-324910, a transient ultra-luminous X-ray source located in the galaxy NGC 3621. This system is characterised by a transient nature and marked variability with characteristic time-scale of ~3500 s, differently from other ULXs, which in the vast majority show limited intra-observation variability. Such a behaviour is very reminiscent of the so-called heartbeats sometimes observed in the Galactic black hole binary GRS 1915+105, where the variability time-scale is ~10-1000 s. We study the spectral and timing properties of this object and find that overall, once the differences in the variability time-scales are taken into account, they match quite closely those of both GRS 1915+105, and of a number of objects showing heartbeats in their light-curves, including a confirmed neutron star and a super-massive black hole powering an active galactic nucleus. We investigate the nature of the compact object in 4XMM J111816.0-324910 by searching for typical neutron star signatures and by attempting a mass estimate based on different methods and assumptions. Based on the current available data, we are not able to unambiguously determine the nature of the accreting compact object responsible for the observed phenomenology.