Date of Award
Spring 2026
Degree Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Science (MS)
Department
Physics
College
College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences
First Advisor
Bernhard Beck-Winchatz
Abstract
The discovery and classification of Compact X-ray Binaries (CXRBs) within globular clusters improves our understanding of stellar encounters, the evolution of globular clusters, accretion physics, and the high-energy physics of the compact objects involved in these systems. For this reason, scientists compare X-ray observations from the Chandra X-ray Observa?tory with visible and UV observations from the Hubble Space Telescope to find objects of unusual colors and magnitudes which might be CXRBs. However, this process is time-consuming and requires significant amounts of data and expertise to achieve reliable classifications. This paper de?scribes this process, as well as a proposed automated process to math?ematically identify the Main Sequence of a globular cluster and provide a numerical score to each candidate star, identifying the best candidate for each X-ray source. This process was tested on clusters NGC 5904, NGC 7099, and NGC 104 (47 Tuc), identifying a total of 26 cataclysmic variables, 71 magnetically active binaries, 102 millisecond pulsars, 4 qui?escent low-mass X-ray binaries, and 1 active galactic nucleus. 110 of these identifications were made with high confidence, 69 of them with medium confidence, 25 of them with low confidence, and 9 sources were unable to be matched. Sources in clusters NGC 5904 and NGC 7099 were manually inspected using color-magnitude diagrams and finding charts and judged to be reasonable identifications. While this process can be improved by the addition of more criteria and the refinement of the parameters used to score candidates, it has the potential to vastly improve CXRB identi?fication in both efficiency and accuracy.
Copyright
Copyright © 2026 Justin Brooks
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Recommended Citation
Brooks, Justin, "Automation of Discovery and Classification of Compact X-ray Binaries in Globular Clusters" (2026). Theses and Dissertations from DePaul University. 118.
https://via.library.depaul.edu/theses-dissertations/118