Photon-axion conversion in Active Galactic Nuclei?
High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena
2009-05-26 v1 Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics
High Energy Physics - Phenomenology
Abstract
Axion-Like Particles (ALPs) are the focus of intense current research. We analyze photon-ALP conversion in the context of relativistic jet models of Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) for more than 100 sources. Contrary to previous claims, we find that this process cannot occur above 100 GeV regardless of the actual AGN model and the values of ALP parameters. This result rules out a proposed strategy to bypass the cosmic opacity above 100 GeV, as apparently required by observations. We also show that for some AGN an observable effect can show up in the X and soft gamma-ray bands.
Cite
@article{arxiv.0905.3752,
title = {Photon-axion conversion in Active Galactic Nuclei?},
author = {Nicola Bassan and Marco Roncadelli},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0905.3752},
year = {2009}
}
Comments
5 pages, 4 figures, submitted to PRL