Related papers: Extreme TeV blazars and the intergalactic magnetic…
With their rapid, violent variability and broad featureless continuum emission, blazars have puzzled astronomers for over two decades. Today blazars represent the only extragalactic objects detected in high-energy gamma-rays. Their spectral…
Extremely high-peaked BL Lac objects (or extreme blazars) are unique extragalactic laboratories where particle acceleration processes are pushed at their physical limits. In these blazars, synchrotron emission peaking above keV energies is…
The highest-energy blazars exhibit non-thermal radiation extending beyond 1 TeV with high luminosities and strong variabilities, indicating extreme particle acceleration in their relativistic jets. The gamma-ray spectra of blazars contain…
Joint observations of extreme blazars with Fermi Large Area Telescope (LAT) and Imaging Atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes (IACT) have been previously used to derive lower bounds on intergalactic magnetic field (IGMF). We update these…
Ground-based observatories have been collecting 0.2 - 20 TeV gamma rays from blazars for about twenty years. These gamma rays can experience absorption along the line of sight due to interactions with the extragalactic background light…
Recent observations of the TeV gamma-ray spectra of the two closest active galactic nuclei (AGNs), Markarian 501 (Mrk 501) and Markarian 421 (Mrk 421), by the Whipple and HEGRA collaborations have stimulated efforts to estimate or limit the…
Blazars are the most abundant type of extragalactic gamma-ray source, usually presenting high variability across the electromagnetic spectrum. Their Very High Energy (VHE, above 0.1 TeV) emission has been studied in detail using Air…
We report results of a spectroscopic campaign carried out at the 10 m Gran Telescopio Canarias for a sample of 22 BL Lac objects detected (or candidates) at TeV energies, aimed to determine or constrain their redshift. This is of…
Recent gamma-ray observations of the blazar 1ES 1101-232 (redshift z=0.186) reveal that the unabsorbed TeV spectrum is hard, with spectral index $\alpha \lesssim 0.5$ [$F(\nu) \propto \nu^{-\alpha}$]. We show that simple one-zone…
We derive lower bounds on intergalactic magnetic fields (IGMFs) from upper limits on the pair echo emission from the blazar Mrk 501, that is, delayed GeV emission from secondary $e^{-}e^{+}$ pairs produced via interactions of primary TeV…
Blazars have traditionally been separated into two broad categories based upon their optical emission characteristics; BL Lacs, with faint or no emission lines, and flat spectrum radio quasars (FSRQs) with prominent, broad emission lines.…
Very high-energy gamma-ray emission from PKS 0447-439 was detected with the H.E.S.S. Cherenkov telescope array in December 2009. This blazar is one of the brightest extragalactic objects in the Fermi Bright Source List and has a hard…
We have recently proposed a simplified scenario for blazars in which these sources are classified as flat-spectrum radio quasars or BL Lacs according to the prescriptions of unified schemes, and to a varying combination of Doppler boosted…
In this paper, we compile the very-high-energy and high-energy spectral indices of 43 BL Lac objects from the literature. Based on a simple math model, $\Delta\Gamma_{obs}=\alpha {\rm{z}}+\beta $, we present evidence for the origin of an…
We present the first detection of the nearby (z=0.084) low-luminosity BL Lac object 1ES 1741+196 in the very high energy (VHE: E$>$100 GeV) band. This object lies in a triplet of interacting galaxies. Early predictions had suggested 1ES…
More than a dozen blazars are known to be emitters of multi-TeV gamma rays, often with strong and rapid flaring activity. By interacting with photons of the cosmic microwave and infrared backgrounds, these gamma rays inevitably produce…
The extreme TeV blazar 1ES 0229+200 is a high-frequency-peaked BL Lacertae object. It has not shown intraday variability in extensive optical and X-ray observations. Nor has it shown any significant variability on any measurable timescale…
Aim: We have collected the most complete multi-wavelength ($6.0 - 6.0 \times 10^{-18} cm$) dataset of very high energy (VHE) $\gamma$-ray emitting (TeV) BL Lacs, which are the most numerous extragalactic VHE sources. Using significant…
Multiwavelength variability of blazars offers indirect insight into their powerful engines and on the mechanisms through which energy is propagated from the centre down the jet. The BL Lac object Mkn 421 is a TeV emitter, a bright blazar at…
Recently, a new method to constrain the distance of blazars with unknown redshift using combined observations in the GeV and TeV regimes has been developed, with the underlying assumption that the Very High Energy (VHE) spectrum corrected…