Journal article
Very-high energy observations of the Galactic center region by VERITAS in 2010-2012
The Astrophysical journal, Vol.790(2), 149
06/24/2014
DOI: 10.1088/0004-637X/790/2/149
Abstract
The Galactic center is an interesting region for high-energy (0.1-100 GeV) and very-high-energy (E > 100 GeV) gamma-ray observations. Potential sources of GeV/TeV gamma-ray emission have been suggested, e.g., the accretion of matter onto the supermassive black hole, cosmic rays from a nearby supernova remnant (e.g. SgrA East), particle acceleration in a plerion, or the annihilation of dark matter particles. The Galactic center has been detected by EGRET and by Fermi/LAT in the MeV/GeV energy band. At TeV energies, the Galactic center was detected with moderate significance by the CANGAROO and Whipple 10 m telescopes and with high significance by H.E.S.S., MAGIC, and VERITAS. We present the results from three years of VERITAS observations conducted at large zenith angles resulting in a detection of the Galactic center on the level of 18 standard deviations at energies above ~2.5TeV. The energy spectrum is derived and is found to be compatible with hadronic, leptonic and hybrid emission models discussed in the literature. Future, more detailed measurements of the high-energy cutoff and better constraints on the high-energy flux variability will help to refine and/or disentangle the individual models.
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- Very-high energy observations of the Galactic center region by VERITAS in 2010-2012
- Creators
- VERITAS Collaboration
- Contributors
- P Kaaret (Contributor) - University of Iowa, Physics and Astronomy
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Publication Details
- The Astrophysical journal, Vol.790(2), 149
- DOI
- 10.1088/0004-637X/790/2/149
- ISSN
- 0004-637X
- eISSN
- 1538-4357
- Publisher
- Institute of Physics (IOP)
- Grant note
- unidentified / Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (nserc_______::NSERC) 10/RFP/AST2748 / Science Foundation Ireland (sfi_________::SFI)
- Language
- English
- Date published
- 06/24/2014
- Academic Unit
- Physics and Astronomy
- Record Identifier
- 9984199696002771
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