Emitting electron spectra and acceleration processes in the jet of PKS 0447−439

Abstract

Abstract We investigate the electron energy distributions (EEDs) and the corresponding acceleration processes in the jet of PKS 0447−439, and estimate its redshift through modeling its observed spectral energy distribution (SED) in the frame of a one-zone synchrotron-self Compton (SSC) model. Three EEDs formed in different acceleration scenarios are assumed: the power-law with exponential cut-off (PLC) EED (shock-acceleration scenario or the case of the EED approaching equilibrium in the stochastic-acceleration scenario), the log-parabolic (LP) EED (stochastic-acceleration scenario and the acceleration dominating), and the broken power-law (BPL) EED (no acceleration scenario). The corresponding fluxes of both synchrotron and SSC are then calculated. The model is applied to PKS 0447−439, and modeled SEDs are compared to the observed SED of this object by using the Markov Chain Monte Carlo method. The results show that the PLC model fails to fit the observed SED well, while the LP and BPL models give comparably good fits for the observed SED. The results indicate that it is possible that a stochastic acceleration process acts in the emitting region of PKS 0447−439 and the EED is far from equilibrium (acceleration dominating) or no acceleration process works (in the emitting region). The redshift of PKS 0447−439 is also estimated in our fitting: z = 0.16 ± 0.05 for the LP case and z = 0.17 ± 0.04 for BPL case.