Related papers: Surprises in the Hard X-ray Sky
Clusters of galaxies and the large scale filaments that connect neighboring clusters are expected to be sites of acceleration of charged particles and sources of non-thermal radiation from radio frequencies to gamma rays. Gamma rays are…
Astrophysical searches for gamma rays are one of the main strategies to probe the annihilation or decay of dark matter particles. We present a new class of distinct sub-GeV spectral features that generically appear in kinematical situations…
Gamma-ray binaries have been uncovered as a new class of Galactic objects in the very high energy sky (> 100 GeV). The three systems known today have hard X-ray spectra (photon index ~ 1.5), extended radio emission and a high luminosity in…
Contemporary astronomy benefits of very large and rapidly growing amounts of data in all bands of the electromagnetic spectrum, from long-wavelength radio waves to high energy gamma-rays. Astronomers normally specialize in data taken in one…
Gamma ray bursts (GRBs) are astronomical phenomena detected at highest energies. The gamma ray photons carry energies on the order of mega-electronovolts and arrive to us from the point-like sources that are uniformly distributed on the…
The observed spatial distribution of $\gamma-$ray bursts indicates that they probably originate at cosmological distances. At this distance scale their variability timescale and flux above MeV imply an initial optical-depth to pair…
Polarimetry is widely considered a powerful observational technique in X-ray astronomy, useful to enhance our understanding of the emission mechanisms, geometry and magnetic field arrangement of many compact objects. However, the lack of…
The diffuse gamma radiation arising from the interaction of cosmic ray particles with matter and radiation in the Galaxy is one of the few probes available to study the origin of the cosmic rays. Milagro is a water Cherenkov detector that…
During the Core Programme, INTEGRAL has surveyed a large portion of the sky (around 9000 square degrees); although INTEGRAL is not optimized for extra-galactic studies its observations have nevertheless given us the opportunity to explore…
X-ray binaries are binary star systems in which a compact object (a neutron star or a black hole) and a relatively normal star orbit a common centre of mass. Since the discovery of X-ray binaries with the first X-ray telescopes in the…
Propagation of ultra-high energy photons in the galactic and intergalactic space gives rise to cascades comprising thousands of photons. Using Monte Carlo simulations, we investigate the development of such cascades in the solar…
Cosmic ray protons generate gamma-rays, neutrinos, and secondary electrons and positrons (e+/-) through pion-producing collisions with gas atoms. Any synchrotron or Inverse Compton (IC) radiation from secondary e+/- is therefore accompanied…
We consider the process of scattering of Galactic cosmic-ray electrons and protons off of dark matter with the radiation of a final-state photon. This process provides a novel way to search for Galactic dark matter with gamma rays. We argue…
The energy density of the Cosmic X-ray background (XRB) peaks around 30 keV (see Figure 1), an energy not yet probed by focussing imaging instruments. The first hard X-ray telescope due to fly on a space mission will be that on board…
A new scheme of hard x-ray or gamma ray light is considered. The excitation of the Langmuir wave in an ultra dense electron beamm via the two-stream instabilities and the interaction of the excited Langmuir wave with the visible light-laser…
A deep all-sky imaging hard x-ray survey and wide-field monitor is needed to extend soft (ROSAT) and medium (ABRIXAS2) x-ray surveys into the 10-100 keV band (and beyond) at comparable sensitivity (~0.05 mCrab). This would enable discovery…
Can we learn about New Physics with astronomical and astro-particle data? Since its launch in 2008, the Large Area Telescope, onboard of the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope, has detected the largest amount of gamma rays in the 20 MeV - 300…
The origin of the hard (2-10 keV) X-ray background has remained mysterious for over 35 years. Most of the soft (0.5-2 keV) X-ray background has been resolved into discrete sources, which are primarily quasars; however, these sources do not…
Recent detections of gravitational wave signals and neutrinos from gamma-ray sources have ushered in the era of multi-messenger astronomy, while highlighting the importance of gamma-ray observations for this emerging field. AMEGO-X, the…
Recent X-ray observations have had a major impact on topics ranging from protostars to cosmology. They have also drawn attention to important and general physical processes that currently limit our understanding of thermal and nonthermal…