Journal article
The impact of plasma instabilities on the spectra of TeV blazars
- Abstract:
- Relativistic jets from blazars are known to be sources of very high energy gamma rays (VHEGRs). During their propagation in the intergalactic space, VHEGRs interact with pervasive cosmological photon fields such as the extragalactic background light (EBL) and the cosmic microwave background (CMB), producing electron–positron pairs. These pairs can upscatter CMB/EBL photons to high energies via inverse Compton (IC) scattering, thereby continuing the cascade process. This is often used to set limits on intergalactic magnetic fields (IGMFs). However, the picture may change if plasma instabilities, arising due to the interaction of the pairs with the intergalactic medium (IGM), cool down the electrons/positrons faster than inverse Compton scattering. As a consequence, the kinetic energy lost by the pairs to the IGM could cause a hardening in the observed gamma-ray spectrum at energies below ∼100 GeV. Here, we study several types and models of instabilities and assess their impact for interpreting observations of distant blazars. Our results suggest that plasma instabilities can describe the spectra of some blazars and mimic the effects of IGMFs, depending on parameters such as intrinsic spectrum of the object, the density and temperature of the IGM, and the luminosity of the beam. On the other hand, we find that for our fiducial set of parameters plasma instabilities do not have a major impact on the spectra of some of the blazars studied. Therefore, they may be used for constraining IGMFs.
- Publication status:
- Published
- Peer review status:
- Peer reviewed
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(Preview, Version of record, 2.8MB, Terms of use)
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- Publisher copy:
- 10.1093/mnras/stz2389
Authors
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- Journal:
- Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society More from this journal
- Volume:
- 489
- Issue:
- 3
- Pages:
- 3836-3849
- Publication date:
- 2019-09-02
- Acceptance date:
- 2019-08-26
- DOI:
- EISSN:
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1365-2966
- ISSN:
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0035-8711
- Language:
-
English
- Keywords:
- Pubs id:
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998125
- Local pid:
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pubs:998125
- Deposit date:
-
2021-08-04
Terms of use
- Copyright holder:
- Alves Batista et al.
- Copyright date:
- 2019
- Rights statement:
- © 2019 The Author(s). Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Royal Astronomical Society This article is published and distributed under the terms of the Oxford University Press, Standard Journals Publication Model.
- Licence:
- Other
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