Related papers: RoboPol: optical polarization-plane rotations and …
Blazars are a kind of active galactic nuclei (AGN) in which a relativistic jet is considered to be directed along the line of sight. They are characterized by strong and rapid variability of the flux and high polarization. We performed a…
The magnetic field conditions in astrophysical relativistic jets can be probed by multiwavelength polarimetry, which has been recently extended to X-rays. For example, one can track how the magnetic field changes in the flow of the…
We analyse the circular polarisation data accumulated in the first 7 years of the POLAMI project introduced in an accompanying paper (Agudo et al.). In the 3mm wavelength band, we acquired more than 2600 observations, and all but one of our…
Blazars are relativistic magnetized plasma outflows from supermassive black holes that point very close to our line of sight. Their emission is nonthermal dominated and highly variable across the entire electromagnetic spectrum.…
Rotations of the electric vector position angle (EVPA) in blazars are often close to an integral multiple of 180$^\circ$. There are multiple examples of this in the literature, and our analysis here, of the optical polarization data from…
Blazars are astrophysical sources whose emission is dominated by non-thermal processes, typically interpreted as synchrotron and inverse Compton emission. Although the general picture is rather robust and consistent with observations, many…
This paper presents a simple model of polarisation rotation in optically thin relativistic jets of blazars. The model is based on the development of helical (kink) mode of current-driven instability. A possible explanation is suggested for…
At optical/ultraviolet energies, blazars display an underlying thermal (unpolarized) contribution from the accretion disc, torus and line emitting regions, diluting the polarized emission from the jet-component. Optical polarimetry can be…
Millimeter-band polarimetry offers a powerful probe of AGN jets, accessing regions less affected by opacity and Faraday rotation than at longer radio wavelengths. As part of the POLAMI program, we have conducted 14 years of 1 mm and 3 mm…
We present the design and performance of RoboPol, a four-channel optical polarimeter operating at the Skinakas Observatory in Crete, Greece. RoboPol is capable of measuring both relative linear Stokes parameters $q$ and $u$ (and the total…
Observations of quasars show that the polarization position angle of the emission coming from them varies greatly over time, including periods called rotations during which the angle changes in an orderly manner. The study proposes a method…
We present the results of a photopolarimetric study of the blazar OJ287 in the period November 2012-January 2015. Observations were conducted using the Focal Reductor FoReRo-2 of the 2-meter RCC telescope of the National Astronomical…
We have detected significant Rotation Measure variations for 9 bright pulsars, as a function of pulse longitude. An additional sample of 10 pulsars showed a rather constant RM with phase, yet a small degree of RM fluctuation is visible in…
The polarization signatures of the blazar emissions are known to be highly variable. In addition to small fluctuations of the polarization angle around a mean value, sometimes large (> 180^o) polarization angle swings are observed. We…
The Crab nebula and its pulsar have been observed for about 3 hours with the high-speed photo-polarimeter OPTIMA in January 2002 at the Calar Alto 3.5m telescope. The Crab pulsar intensity and polarization are determined at all phases of…
We investigate the previously proposed possibility that multi-epoch broadband polarimetry could act as a complement or limited proxy for VLBI observations of blazars, in that the number of polarised emission components in the jet, and some…
We describe the data reduction pipeline and control system for the RoboPol project. The RoboPol project is monitoring the optical $R$-band magnitude and linear polarization of a large sample of active galactic nuclei that is dominated by…
Blazars are thought to possess a relativistic jet that is pointing toward the direction of the Earth and the elect of relativistic beaming enhances its apparent brightness. They radiate in all wavebands from the radio to the gamma-ray bands…
The X-ray polarization observations made possible with the Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE) offer new ways of probing high-energy emission processes in astrophysical jets from blazars. Here we report on the first X-ray polarization…
Previous INTEGRAL/IBIS observations have shown that the gamma-ray radiation of the Crab Nebula is highly polarised and remarkably aligned along the axis of rotation of the pulsar (Forot et al. 2008). Their study was based on the first four…