227 research outputs found

    On leptonic models for blazars in the Fermi era

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    Some questions raised by Fermi-LAT data about blazars are summarized, along with attempts at solutions within the context of leptonic models. These include both spectral and statistical questions, including the origin of the GeV breaks in low-synchrotron peaked blazars, the location of the gamma-ray emission sites, the correlations in the spectral energy distributions with luminosity, and the difficulty of synchrotron/SSC models to fit the spectra of some TeV blazars.Comment: 9 pages, 1 figure, in "Beamed and Unbeamed Gamma Rays from Galaxies," Muonio, Finland, 11-15 April, 2011, ed. R. Wagner, L. Maraschi, A. Sillanpaa, to appear in Journal of Physics: Conference Serie

    Fermi Large Area Telescope Constraints on the Gamma-ray Opacity of the Universe

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    The Extragalactic Background Light (EBL) includes photons with wavelengths from ultraviolet to infrared, which are effective at attenuating gamma rays with energy above ~10 GeV during propagation from sources at cosmological distances. This results in a redshift- and energy-dependent attenuation of the gamma-ray flux of extragalactic sources such as blazars and Gamma-Ray Bursts (GRBs). The Large Area Telescope onboard Fermi detects a sample of gamma-ray blazars with redshift up to z~3, and GRBs with redshift up to z~4.3. Using photons above 10 GeV collected by Fermi over more than one year of observations for these sources, we investigate the effect of gamma-ray flux attenuation by the EBL. We place upper limits on the gamma-ray opacity of the Universe at various energies and redshifts, and compare this with predictions from well-known EBL models. We find that an EBL intensity in the optical-ultraviolet wavelengths as great as predicted by the "baseline" model of Stecker et al. (2006) can be ruled out with high confidence.Comment: 42 pages, 12 figures, accepted version (24 Aug.2010) for publication in ApJ; Contact authors: A. Bouvier, A. Chen, S. Raino, S. Razzaque, A. Reimer, L.C. Reye

    Erratum to: 36th International Symposium on Intensive Care and Emergency Medicine

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    [This corrects the article DOI: 10.1186/s13054-016-1208-6.]

    Gamma-ray and radio properties of six pulsars detected by the fermi large area telescope

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    We report the detection of pulsed γ-rays for PSRs J0631+1036, J0659+1414, J0742-2822, J1420-6048, J1509-5850, and J1718-3825 using the Large Area Telescope on board the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope (formerly known as GLAST). Although these six pulsars are diverse in terms of their spin parameters, they share an important feature: their γ-ray light curves are (at least given the current count statistics) single peaked. For two pulsars, there are hints for a double-peaked structure in the light curves. The shapes of the observed light curves of this group of pulsars are discussed in the light of models for which the emission originates from high up in the magnetosphere. The observed phases of the γ-ray light curves are, in general, consistent with those predicted by high-altitude models, although we speculate that the γ-ray emission of PSR J0659+1414, possibly featuring the softest spectrum of all Fermi pulsars coupled with a very low efficiency, arises from relatively low down in the magnetosphere. High-quality radio polarization data are available showing that all but one have a high degree of linear polarization. This allows us to place some constraints on the viewing geometry and aids the comparison of the γ-ray light curves with high-energy beam models

    Multiwavelength Picture of the Blazar S5 0716+714 during Its Brightest Outburst

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    S5 0716+714 is a well known BL Lac object, and one of the brightest and most active blazars. The discovery in the Very High Energy band (VHE, E > 100 GeV) by MAGIC happened in 2008. In January 2015, the source went through the brightest optical state ever observed, triggering MAGIC follow-up and a VHE detection with ∼ 13σ significance (ATel ♯6999 ). Rich multiwavelength coverage of the flare allowed us to construct the broad-band spectral energy distribution of S5 0716+714 during its brightest outburst. In this work, we will present the preliminary analysis of MAGIC and Fermi-LAT data of the flaring activity in January and February 2015 for the HE (0.1 < HE < 300 GeV) and VHE band, together with radio (Metsähovi, OVRO, VLBA, Effelsberg), sub-millimeter (SMA), optical (Tuorla, Perkins, Steward, AZT-8+ST7, LX-200, Kanata), X-ray and UV (Swift-XRT and UVOT), in the same time-window and discuss the time variability of the multiwavelength light curves during this impressive outburst.</p

    Model-based Cross-correlation Search for Gravitational Waves from the Low-mass X-Ray Binary Scorpius X-1 in LIGO O3 Data

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    We present the results of a model-based search for continuous gravitational waves from the low-mass X-ray binary Scorpius X-1 using LIGO detector data from the third observing run of Advanced LIGO and Advanced Virgo. This is a semicoherent search that uses details of the signal model to coherently combine data separated by less than a specified coherence time, which can be adjusted to balance sensitivity with computing cost. The search covered a range of gravitational-wave frequencies from 25 to 1600 Hz, as well as ranges in orbital speed, frequency, and phase determined from observational constraints. No significant detection candidates were found, and upper limits were set as a function of frequency. The most stringent limits, between 100 and 200 Hz, correspond to an amplitude h0 of about 10−25 when marginalized isotropically over the unknown inclination angle of the neutron star's rotation axis, or less than 4 × 10−26 assuming the optimal orientation. The sensitivity of this search is now probing amplitudes predicted by models of torque balance equilibrium. For the usual conservative model assuming accretion at the surface of the neutron star, our isotropically marginalized upper limits are close to the predicted amplitude from about 70 to 100 Hz; the limits assuming that the neutron star spin is aligned with the most likely orbital angular momentum are below the conservative torque balance predictions from 40 to 200 Hz. Assuming a broader range of accretion models, our direct limits on gravitational-wave amplitude delve into the relevant parameter space over a wide range of frequencies, to 500 Hz or more
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