Description
The STONKS pipeline, developed for XMM-Newton, is lifting the curtain on a new population of highly variable X-ray sources. Now a part of the XMM pipeline, STONKS examines all detected sources in observations and automatically alerts the community to variable and transient sources, using a multi-mission X-ray source catalogue. By repurposing the capabilities of a pointing X-ray observatory STONKS can leverage a far greater sensitivity depth, and more precise locations than can be achieved by wide field-of-view survey instruments. STONKS and XMM therefore enable the X-ray community to identify, and promptly follow-up, faint and bright X-ray transient events at greater distances than ever before.
We present this novel methodology for transient detection with XMM-Newton and identify some of the most interesting and exciting sources which STONKS has contributed to the community. We will also demonstrate how STONKS is being implemented within the framework of XMM, and how the community can engage with STONKS in the future.
