Galactic Gamma-ray Sources Research Articles

Geminga's pulsar halo: An X-ray view

Geminga is the first pulsar around which a remarkable gamma-ray halo extending over a few degrees was discovered at TeV energies by MILAGRO and HAWC and later by H.E.S.S., and by -LAT in the GeV band. More middle-aged pulsars have exhibited gamma-ray halos, and they are now recognised as an emerging class of Galactic gamma-ray sources. The emission appears in the late evolution stage of pulsars, and is most plausibly explained by inverse Compton scattering of CMB and interstellar photons by relativistic electrons and positrons escaping from the pulsar wind nebulae. These observations pose a number of theoretical challenges, particularly the origin of the inferred, significantly lower effective diffusion coefficients around the pulsar when compared to typical Galactic values. Tackling these questions requires constraining the ambient magnetic field properties, which can be achieved through X-ray observations. If the gamma-ray halos originate from a distribution of highly energetic electrons, synchrotron losses in the ambient magnetic fields of the same particles are expected to produce a diffuse X-ray emission with a similar spatial extension. We present the most comprehensive X-ray study of the Geminga pulsar halo to date, utilising archival data from and . Our X-ray analysis covers a broad bandwidth ($0.5 79$ keV) and large field of view ($ for the first time. This was achieved by accurately measuring the background over the entire field of view, and taking into account both focused and stray-light X-ray photons from the pulsar halo with . We find no significant emission and set robust constraints on the X-ray halo flux. These are translated to stringent constraints on the ambient magnetic field strength and the diffusion coefficient by using a physical model considering particle injection, diffusion, and cooling over the pulsar’s lifetime, which is tuned by fitting multi-wavelength data. Our novel methodology for modelling and searching for synchrotron X-ray halos can be applied to other pulsar halo candidates.

Unstable cosmic ray nuclei constrain low-diffusion zones in the Galactic disc

ABSTRACT Observations of the vicinity of a variety of galactic gamma-ray sources have indicated a local suppression of diffusivity of cosmic rays (CRs) by up to three orders of magnitude. However, the impact of these low-diffusion zones on global properties of CR transport is, however, only poorly understood. Here, we argue that CR nuclear ratios, like the boron-to-carbon ratio and relative abundances of Beryllium isotopes are sensitive to the filling fraction of such low-diffusion zones and hence their measurements can be used to constrain the typical sizes and ages of such regions. We have performed a careful parameter study of a CR transport model that allows for different diffusion coefficients κdisc and κhalo in the galactic disc and halo, respectively. Making use of preliminary data from the AMS-02 experiment on the ratio of Beryllium isotopes, we find a 3.5σ preference for a suppression of the diffusion coefficient in the disc with a best-fitting value of $\kappa _{\mathrm{disc}}/\kappa _{\mathrm{halo}} = 0.20^{+0.10}_{-0.06}$. We forecast that with upcoming data from the HELIX balloon experiment, the significance could increase to 6.8σ. Adopting a coarse-graining approach, we find that such a strong suppression could be realized if the filling fraction of low-diffusion zones in the disc was $\sim 66~{{\ \rm per\ cent}}$. We conclude that the impact of regions of suppressed diffusion might be larger than usually assumed and ought to be taken into account in models of Galactic CR transport.

Testing source confusion and identification capability in Cherenkov telescope array data

ABSTRACT The Cherenkov Telescope Array will provide the deepest survey of the Galactic Plane performed at very-high-energy gamma-rays. Consequently, this survey will unavoidably face the challenge of source confusion, i.e. the non-unique attribution of signal to a source due to multiple overlapping sources. Among the known populations of Galactic gamma-ray sources and given their extension and number, pulsar wind nebulae (PWNe, and PWN TeV haloes) will be the most affected. We aim to probe source confusion of TeV PWNe in forthcoming CTA data. For this purpose, we performed and analysed simulations of artificially confused PWNe with CTA. As a basis for our simulations, we applied our study to TeV data collected from the H.E.S.S. Galactic Plane Survey for ten extended and two point-like firmly identified PWNe, probing various configurations of source confusion involving different projected separations, relative orientations, flux levels, and extensions among sources. Source confusion, defined here to appear when the sum of the Gaussian width of two sources is larger than the separation between their centroids, occurred in ∼30 per cent of the simulations. For this sample and 0.5° of average separation between sources, we found that CTA can likely resolve up to 60 per cent of those confused sources above 500 GeV. Finally, we also considered simulations of isolated extended sources to see how well they could be matched to a library of morphological templates. The outcome of the simulations indicates a remarkable capability (more than 95 per cent of the cases studied) to match a simulation with the correct input template in its proper orientation.

Chapter 2 Galactic Gamma-ray Sources * *Supported by Key Research and Development Project (2018YFA0404204, 2016YFA0400804), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (11905043, 11803011, 12173018, 12121003, 11773014, 11633007, U1931204, U1731136), the Original Innovation Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (E085021002), Guangdong Major Project of Basic and Applied Basic Research (2019B030302001) and science research grant from the China Manned Space

In the γ-ray sky, the highest fluxes come from Galactic sources: supernova remnants (SNRs), pulsars and pulsar wind nebulae, star forming regions, binaries and micro-quasars, giant molecular clouds, Galactic center, and the large extended area around the Galactic plane. The radiation mechanisms of γ-ray emission and the physics of the emitting particles, such as the origin, acceleration, and propagation, are of very high astrophysical significance. A variety of theoretical models have been suggested for the relevant physics, and emission with energies E≥1014 eV are expected to be crucial in testing them. In particular, this energy band is a direct window to test at which maximum energy a particle can be accelerated in the Galactic sources and whether the most probable source candidates such as Galactic center and SNRs are “PeVatrons”. Designed aiming at the very high energy (VHE, >100 GeV) observation, LHAASO will be a very powerful instrument in these astrophysical studies. Over the past decade, great advances have been made in the VHE γ-ray astronomy. More than 170 VHE γ-ray sources have been observed, and among them, 42 Galactic sources fall in the LHAASO field-of-view. With a sensitivity of 10 milli-Crab, LHAASO can not only provide accurate spectra for the known γ-ray sources, but also search for new TeV-PeV γ-ray sources. In the following sub-sections, the observation of all the Galactic sources with LHAASO will be discussed in details.

The origin of the power–law form of the extragalactic gamma–ray flux

The Fermi–LAT telescope has measured the extragalactic gamma–ray background (EGB) generated by the ensemble of all extragalactic sources. The energy distribution of the EGB is well described as a power–law with a spectral index approximately equal to 2.3, and an exponential cutoff, that is consistent with being the effect of absorption of high energy photons assuming an emission that is an unbroken power–law spectrum. The observations of the Fermi telescope have also resolved the EGB, determining that most of it is formed by the sum of the contributions of Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) of the blazar class. The spectra of the individual AGN sources have a broad range of spectral shapes, and the brightest and most precisely measured sources have curved spectra that can be fitted with the “log–parabola” (or log–normal) form. This suggests that the power law form of the extragalactic gamma–ray flux emerges as a property of the ensemble of all sources, and not as a universal shape generated by each individual source. This result is consistent with the idea that particle acceleration in blazars can be considered as a “critical phenomenon”. A curved log–parabola (log–normal) form is also required to fit the spectra of many Galactic gamma–ray sources, including the emission from the brightest supernova remnants (SNR), and an intriguing possibility is that also the Galactic cosmic rays are injected in interstellar space by their sources not with a single universal power–law spectrum, as predicted by the commonly accepted models, but instead with a broad range of spectral shapes.

Modulations in Spectra of Galactic Gamma-ray sources as a result of photon-ALPs mixing.

Axion like particles (ALPs) are fundamental pseudo scalar particles with properties similar to Axions which are a well-known extensions of the standard model to solve the strong CP problem in Quantum Chromodynamics. ALPs can oscillate into photons and vice versa in the presence of an external tranversal magnetic field. This oscillation of photon and ALPs could have important implications for astronomical observations, i.e. a characteristic energy dependent attenuation in Gamma ray spectra for astrophysical sources. Here we have revisited the opportunity to search Photon-ALPs coupling in the disappearance channel. We use eight years of Fermi Pass 8 data of a selection of promising galactic Gamma-ray source candidates and study the modulation in the spectra in accordance with Photon-ALPs mixing and estimate best fit values of the parameters i.e. Photon-ALPs coupling constant (gʱγγ) and ALPs mass(mα). For the magnetic field we use large scale galactic magnetic field models based on Faraday rotation measurements and we have also studied the survival probability of photons in the Galactic plane.

Phenomenology of gamma-ray emitting binaries

Gamma-ray emitting binaries (GREBs) are complex systems. Its study became in the last years a major endeavour for the high-energy astrophysics community, both from an observational and a theoretical perspective. Whereas the accumulation of observation time for most Galactic gamma-ray sources is typically leading to highly accurate descriptions of their steady phenomenology, GREBs keep providing “exceptions to the rule” either through long-term monitoring of known systems or in the discovery of new sources of this class. Moreover, many GREBs have been identified as powerful radio, optical and X-ray emitters, and may significantly contribute as well to the Galactic cosmic-ray sea. Their understanding implies, therefore, solving a puzzle in a broad-band and multi-messenger context. In these proceedings we will summarise our current understanding of GREBs, emphasising the most relevant observational results and reviewing a number of controversial properties.

Constraints on Galactic Neutrino Emission with Seven Years of IceCube Data

Abstract The origins of high-energy astrophysical neutrinos remain a mystery despite extensive searches for their sources. We present constraints from seven years of IceCube Neutrino Observatory muon data on the neutrino flux coming from the Galactic plane. This flux is expected from cosmic-ray interactions with the interstellar medium or near localized sources. Two methods were developed to test for a spatially extended flux from the entire plane, both of which are maximum likelihood fits but with different signal and background modeling techniques. We consider three templates for Galactic neutrino emission based primarily on gamma-ray observations and models that cover a wide range of possibilities. Based on these templates and in the benchmark case of an unbroken E − 2.5 power-law energy spectrum, we set 90% confidence level upper limits, constraining the possible Galactic contribution to the diffuse neutrino flux to be relatively small, less than 14% of the flux reported in Aartsen et al. above 1 TeV. A stacking method is also used to test catalogs of known high-energy Galactic gamma-ray sources.

Runaway massive stars as variable gamma-ray sources

Runaway stars are ejected from their formation sites well within molecular cores in giant dark clouds. Eventually, these stars can travel through the molecular clouds, which are highly inhomogeneous. The powerful winds of massive runaway stars interact with the medium forming bowshocks. Recent observations and theoretical modelling suggest that these bowshocks emit non-thermal radiation. As the massive stars move through the inhomogeneous ambient gas the physical properties of the bowshocks are modified, producing changes in the non-thermal emission. We aim to compute the non-thermal radiation produced in the bowshocks of runaway massive stars when travelling through a molecular cloud. We calculate the non-thermal emission and absorption for two types of massive runaway stars, an O9I and an O4I, as they move through a density gradient. We present the spectral energy distributions for the runaway stars modelled. Additionally, we obtain light curves at different energy ranges. We find significant variations in the emission over timescales of $\sim$ 1 yr. We conclude that bowshocks of massive runaway stars, under some assumptions, might be variable gamma-ray sources, with variability timescales that depend on the medium density profile. These objects might constitute a population of galactic gamma-ray sources turning on and off within years.

Observation of TeV gamma ray extended sources with ARGO-YBJ

More than 80% of TeV galactic gamma ray sources are spatially extended and many of them are still unidentified. The extended emission could be the result of cosmic ray interactions with the ambient medium which provides the target to produce TeV gamma rays. The sensitivity of ground based gamma ray detectors decreases for extended sources; shower detectors, due to their large field of view, are less affected with respect to Cherenkov telescopes. The ARGO-YBJ experiment (Yangbajing Cosmic Ray Laboratory, Tibet, China, 4300m of altitude) is an air shower detector devoted to gamma ray astronomy at energies above a few hundred GeV, with an integrated sensitivity ranging from 0.24 to ~1 Crab units, depending on the source declination. In this paper the observation of galactic extended sources with ARGO-YBJ during 5 years is reviewed.

Simulation on gamma ray astronomy research with LHAASO-KM2A

LHAASO (Large High Altitude Air Shower Observatory) is a large project to research on high energy gamma ray astronomy and cosmic ray physics. KM2A (one KM2 Array), one main part of the LHAASO project, using a 1km2 array composed of electron detectors (ED) and muon detectors (MD), focuses on gamma ray astronomy above 30TeV and cosmic ray physics in the “knee” region. Accurate measurement of gamma ray energy spectra above 30TeV is crucial to identify the sources as the galactic cosmic ray accelerators. Monte Carlo simulation indicates that cosmic gamma rays can be distinguished from cosmic nuclei background by using muon content in extensive air showers (EAS). With the sensitivity of about 1% of the integral flux of Crab Nebula, the high duty cycle of at least 90% and the full sky survey, the KM2A array would be very useful in discovering the galactic gamma ray sources and identifying the cosmic ray sources with gamma-ray emission. A detailed simulation is carried out for studying performance and expectation of the KM2A array in gamma ray astronomy above 30TeV.

The HAWC observatory

The High Altitude Water Cherenkov (HAWC) observatory is a new very high energy water Cherenkov gamma ray telescope, now under construction at 4100m altitude at Sierra Negra, Mexico. Due to its increased altitude, larger surface area and improved design, HAWC will be about 15 times more sensitive than its predecessor, Milagro. With its wide field of view and high duty factor, HAWC will be an excellent instrument for the studies of diffuse gamma ray emission, the high energy spectra of Galactic gamma ray sources, and transient emission from extragalactic objects such as GRBs and AGN, as well as surveying a large fraction of the VHE sky.

Anisotropies in the diffuse gamma-ray background measured by the Fermi-LAT

The small angular scale fluctuations of the (on large scale) isotropic gamma-ray background (IGRB) carry information about the presence of unresolved source classes. A guaranteed contribution to the IGRB is expected from the unresolved gamma-ray AGN while other extragalactic sources, Galactic gamma-ray source populations and dark matter Galactic and extragalactic structures (and sub-structures) are candidate contributors.The IGRB was measured with unprecedented precision by the Large Area Telescope (LAT) on-board of the Fermi gamma-ray observatory, and these data were used for measuring the IGRB angular power spectrum (APS). Detailed Monte Carlo simulations of Fermi-LAT all-sky observations were performed to provide a reference against which to compare the results obtained for the real data set. The Monte Carlo simulations are also a method for performing those detailed studies of the APS contributions of single source populations, which are required in order to identify the actual IGRB contributors.We present preliminary results of an anisotropy search in the IGRB. At angular scales <2° (e.g., above multipole 155), angular power above the photon noise level is detected, at energies between 1 and 10GeV in each energy bin, with statistical significance between 7.2 and 4.1σ. The obtained energy dependences point to the presence of one or more unclustered source populations with the components having an average photon index Γ=2.40±0.07.

Galactic sources of high-energy neutrinos: Highlights

We overview high-energy neutrinos from galactic sources, transparent to their gamma-ray emission. We focus on young supernova remnants and in particular on RX J1713.7-3946, discussing expectations and upper bounds. We also consider the possibility to detect neutrinos from other strong galactic gamma-ray sources as Vela Junior, the Cygnus Region and the recently discovered Fermi Bubbles. We quantify the impact of the recent hint for a large value of θ13 on high-energy neutrino oscillations.

Clusters of black holes as point-like gamma-ray sources

The possibility of identifying some of Galactic gamma-ray sources as clusters of primordial black holes is discussed. The known scenarios of supermassive black hole formation indicate the multiple formation of lower-mass black holes. Our analysis demonstrates that due to Hawking evaporation the cluster of black holes with masses about 10 15 g could be observed as a gamma-ray source. The total mass of typical cluster is ∼10 M ⊙. Detailed calculations have been performed on the basis of specific model of primordial black hole formation.

LHAASO-KM2A simulation

At Yangbajing, with altitude of 4300m a.s.l., the LHAASO site is an ideal location for energy spectrum and composition measurements for cosmic rays, including gamma rays, above 30TeV because developing maxima of air showers are 1-2km above the ground. One main part of LHAASO (The Large High Altitude Air Shower Observatory) project, KM2A, using a 1$km^2$ array composed of electron detectors(ED) and muon detectors(MD), focuses on gamma ray astronomy above 30TeV and cosmic ray physics in the ”knee” region. Fine measurement of gamma ray energy spectra above 30TeV is crucial to identify sources as galactic cosmic ray accelerators. Monte Carlo simulation shows that primary gamma showers can be identified event by event using muon content. The observation is background free above 50TeV. With a sensitivity of about 1% $I_{crab}$, high duty cycle of at least 90 % and full sky survey, the array would be very useful in discovering galactic gamma ray sources and identifying cosmic ray sources. A simulation is carried out for optimizing performance of the KM2A array, mainly in gamma ray astronomy above 30TeV . Moreover, compared with the report at the last ICRC, the present one considers more details of detector parameterizations and improves analys

Discovery and follow-up studies of the extended, off-plane, VHE gamma-ray source HESS J1507-622

Context: The detection of gamma-rays in the very-high-energy (VHE) range (100 GeV-100 TeV) offers the possibility of studying the parent population of ultrarelativistic particles found in astrophysical sources, so it is useful for understanding the underlying astrophysical processes in nonthermal sources. Aim: The discovery of the VHE gamma-ray source HESS J1507-622 is reported and possibilities regarding its nature are investigated. Methods: The H.E.S.S. array of imaging atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes (IACTs) has a high sensitivity compared with previous instruments (~1% of the Crab flux in 25 hours observation time for a 5 sigma point-source detection) and has a large field of view (~5 deg in diameter). HESS J1507-622 was discovered within the ongoing H.E.S.S. survey of the inner Galaxy, and the source was also studied by means of dedicated multiwavelength observations. Results: A Galactic gamma-ray source, HESS J1507-622, located ~3.5 deg from the Galactic plane was detected with a statistical significance > 9 sigma. Its energy spectrum is well fitted by a power law with spectral index \Gamma = 2.24 +/- 0.16_{stat} +/- 0.20_{sys} and a flux above 1 TeV of (1.5 +/- 0.4_{stat} +/- 0.3_{sys}) X 10^{-12} cm^{-2} s^{-1}. Possible interpretations (considering both hadronic and leptonic models) of the VHE gamma-ray emission are discussed in the absence of an obvious counterpart.

Constraints on a hadronic model for unidentified off-plane galactic gamma-ray sources

Recently the H.E.S.S. collaboration announced the detection of an unidentified gamma-ray source with an off-set from the galactic plane of 3.5°: HESS J1507-622. If the distance of the object is larger than about one kpc it would be physically located outside the galactic disk. The density profile of the ISM perpendicular to the galactic plane, which acts as target material for hadronic gamma-ray production, drops quite fast with increasing distance. This fact places distance dependent constraints on the energetics and properties of off-plane gamma-ray sources like HESS J1507-622 if a hadronic origin of the gamma-ray emission is assumed. For the case of this source it is found that there seems to be no simple way to link this object to the remnant of a stellar explosions.

HIGH-FREQUENCY RADIO PROPERTIES OF SOURCES IN THEFERMI-LAT 1 YEAR POINT SOURCE CATALOG

The high-frequency radio sky, like the gamma-ray sky surveyed by the Fermi satellite, is dominated by flat spectrum radio quasars and BL Lac objects at bright flux levels. To investigate the relationship between radio and gamma-ray emission in extragalactic sources, we have cross-matched the Australia Telescope 20 GHz survey catalog (AT20G) with the Fermi-LAT 1 year Point Source Catalog (1FGL). The 6.0 sr of sky covered by both catalogs ({\delta} < 0\circ, |b| > 1.\circ 5) contains 5890 AT20G radio sources and 604 1FGL gamma-ray sources. The AT20G source positions are accurate to within ~1 arcsec and, after excluding known Galactic sources, 43% of Fermi 1FGL sources have an AT20G source within the 95% Fermi confidence ellipse. Monte Carlo tests imply that at least 95% of these matches are genuine associations. Only five gamma-ray sources (1% of the Fermi catalog) have more than one AT20G counterpart in the Fermi error box. The AT20G matches also generally support the active galactic nucleus (AGN) associations in the First LAT AGN Catalog. We find a trend of increasing gamma-ray flux density with 20 GHz radio flux density. The Fermi detection rate of AT20G sources is close to 100% for the brightest 20 GHz sources, decreasing to 20% at 1 Jy, and to roughly 1% at 100 mJy. Eight of the matched AT20G sources have no association listed in 1FGL and are presented here as potential gamma-ray AGNs for the first time.We also identify an alternative AGN counterpart to one 1FGL source. The percentage of Fermi sources with AT20G detections decreases toward the Galactic plane, suggesting that the 1FGL catalog contains at least 50 Galactic gamma-ray sources in the southern hemisphere that are yet to be identified.

NEW EVIDENCE FOR A BLACK HOLE IN THE COMPACT BINARY CYGNUS X-3

The bright and highly variable X-ray and radio source known as Cygnus X-3 was among the first X-ray sources discovered, yet it remains in many ways an enigma. Its known to consist of a massive, Wolf-Rayet primary in an extremely tight orbit with a compact object. Yet one of the most basic of parameters - the mass of the compact object - is not known. Nor is it even clear whether its is a neutron star or a black hole. In this Paper we present our analysis of the broad-band high-energy continua covering a substantial range in luminosity and spectral morphology. We apply these results to a recently identified scaling relationship which has been demonstrated to provide reliable estimates of the compact object mass in a number of accretion powered binaries. This analysis leads us to conclude that the compact object in Cygnus X-3 has a mass greater than $4.2M_\odot$ thus clearly indicative of a black hole and as such resolving a long-standing issue. The full range of uncertainty in our analysis and from using a range of recently published distance estimates constrains the compact object mass to lie between $4.2M_\odot$ and $14.4M_\odot$. Our favored estimate, based on a 9.0 kpc distance estimate is $\sim 10 M_\odot$ with the error margin of 3.2 solar masses. This result may thus pose challenges to shared-envelope evolutionary models of compact binaries, as well as establishing Cygnus X-3 as the first confirmed accretion-powered galactic gamma-ray source.