A New Light Boson from Cherenkov Telescopes Observations?
Abstract
Early indications by H.E.S.S. and the subsequent detection of blazar 3C279 by MAGIC show that the Universe is more transparent to very-high-energy gamma rays than previously thought. We demonstrate that this circumstance can be reconciled with standard blazar emission models provided that photon oscillations into a very light Axion-Like Particle occur in extragalactic magnetic fields. A quantitative estimate of this effect indeed explains the observed spectrum of 3C279. Our prediction can be tested by the satellite-borne Fermi/LAT detector as well as by the ground-based Imaging Atmospheric Cherenkov Telescopes H.E.S.S., MAGIC, CANGAROO III, VERITAS and by the Extensive Air Shower arrays ARGO-YBJ and MILAGRO.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.1001.2171,
title = {A New Light Boson from Cherenkov Telescopes Observations?},
author = {Marco Roncadelli and Alessandro De Angelis and Oriana Mansutti},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1001.2171},
year = {2010}
}
Comments
4 pages, 1 image Proceeding of the Rencontres de Moriond on "Very High Energy Phenomena in the Universe", La Thuile, Italy, 1-8 February 2009 (to be published in the Proceedings)