Two long-period X-ray pulsars detected in the SMC field around

Abstract

An XMM-Newton target of opportunity observation of the field around the transient 18.37 s pulsar in the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) revealed two bright, long-period X-ray pulsars in the EPIC data. A new pulsar, , with a pulse period of s was discovered and s pulsations were detected from (=CXOU J005455.6–724510), confirming the period found in Chandra data. We derive X-ray positions of , and , (J2000.0) with an uncertainty of 02 utilizing optical identification with OGLE stars. For both objects, the optical brightness and colours and the X-ray spectra are consistent with Be/X-ray binary systems in the SMC.