2014ApJ...782....3K

AE Aquarii is a cataclysmic variable with the fastest known rotating magnetized white dwarf (P_spin= 33.08 s). Compared to many intermediate polars, AE Aquarii shows a soft X-ray spectrum with a very low luminosity (L_X∼ 10³¹ erg/s). We have analyzed overlapping observations of this system with the NuSTAR and the Swift X-ray observatories in 2012 September. We find the 0.5-30 keV spectra to be well fitted by either an optically thin thermal plasma model with three temperatures of 0.75_–0.45^+0.18, 2.29_–0.82^+0.96, and 9.33_–2.18^+6.07 keV, or an optically thin thermal plasma model with two temperatures of 1.00_–0.23^+0.34 and 4.64_–0.84^+1.58 keV plus a power-law component with photon index of 2.50_–0.23^+0.17. The pulse profile in the 3-20 keV band is broad and approximately sinusoidal, with a pulsed fraction of 16.6%±2.3%. We do not find any evidence for a previously reported sharp feature in the pulse profile.