Discovery of Powerful Gamma-Ray Flares from the Crab Nebula

The well known Crab Nebula is at the center of the SN1054 supernova remnant. It consists of a rotationally-powered pulsar interacting with a surrounding nebula through a relativistic particle wind. The emissions originating from the pulsar and nebula have been considered to be essentially stable. He...

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Veröffentlicht in:	arXiv.org 2011-01
Hauptverfasser:	Tavani, M, Bulgarelli, A, Vittorini, V, Pellizzoni, A, Striani, E, Caraveo, P, Weisskopf, M C, Tennant, A, Pucella, G, Trois, A, Costa, E, Evangelista, Y, Pittori, C, Verrecchia, F, E Del Monte, Campana, R, Pilia, M, De Luca, A, Donnarumma, I, Horns, D, Ferrigno, C, Heinke, C O, Trifoglio, M, Gianotti, F, Vercellone, S, Argan, A, Barbiellini, G, Cattaneo, P W, Chen, A W, Contessi, T, D'Ammando, F, DeParis, G, G Di Cocco, G Di Persio, Feroci, M, Ferrari, A, Galli, M, Giuliani, A, Giusti, M, Labanti, C, Lapshov, I, Lazzarotto, F, Lipari, P, Longo, F, Fuschino, F, Marisaldi, M, Mereghetti, S, Morelli, E, Moretti, E, Morselli, A, Pacciani, L, Perotti, F, Piano, G, Picozza, P, Prest, M, Rapisarda, M, Rappoldi, A, Rubini, A, Sabatini, S, Soffitta, P, Vallazza, E, Zambra, A, Zanello, D, Lucarelli, F, Santolamazza, P, Giommi, P, Salotti, L, Bignami, G F
Format:	Artikel
Sprache:	eng
Schlagworte:	Acceleration Crab nebula Flares Gamma rays Luminosity Physics - High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena Plasma waves Pulsars Relativistic particles Space telescopes Supernova remnants Time
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Zusammenfassung:	The well known Crab Nebula is at the center of the SN1054 supernova remnant. It consists of a rotationally-powered pulsar interacting with a surrounding nebula through a relativistic particle wind. The emissions originating from the pulsar and nebula have been considered to be essentially stable. Here we report the detection of strong gamma-ray (100 MeV-10 GeV) flares observed by the AGILE satellite in September, 2010 and October, 2007. In both cases, the unpulsed flux increased by a factor of 3 compared to the non-flaring flux. The flare luminosity and short timescale favor an origin near the pulsar, and we discuss Chandra Observatory X-ray and HST optical follow-up observations of the nebula. Our observations challenge standard models of nebular emission and require power-law acceleration by shock-driven plasma wave turbulence within a ~1-day timescale.
ISSN:	2331-8422
DOI:	10.48550/arxiv.1101.2311