2006/11/30 by Luis A. Anchordoqui, J. F. Beacom, John F. Beacom +4 · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · #Astrophysics and Cosmic Phenomena #Dark Matter and Cosmic Phenomena #Neutrino Physics Research #astro-ph #hep-ph #nucl-th
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevd.75.063001
published as Phys.Rev.D75:063001,2007 · To be published in Phys. Rev. D
arxiv created 2007/02/05 · openalex publication_date 2007/03/02 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
TeV \ensuremathγ-rays may provide significant information about high energy astrophysical accelerators. Such \ensuremathγ-rays can result from the photo-de-excitation of PeV nuclei after their parents have undergone photo-disintegration in an environment of ultraviolet photons. This process is proposed as a candidate explanation of the recently discovered HEGRA source at the edge of the Cygnus OB2 association. The Lyman-\ensuremathα background is provided by the rich O and B stellar environment. It is found that (1) the HEGRA flux can be obtained if there is efficient acceleration at the source of lower energy nuclei; (2) the requirement that the Lorentz-boosted ultraviolet photons can excite the giant dipole resonance implies a strong suppression of the \ensuremathγ-ray spectrum compared to an E_\ensuremathγ^\ensuremath-2 behavior at energies \ensuremath\lesssim1 TeV (some of these energies will be probed by the upcoming GLAST mission); (3) a TeV neutrino counterpart from neutron decay following helium photo-disintegration will be observed at IceCube only if a major proportion of the kinetic energy budget of the Cygnus OB2 association is expended in accelerating nuclei.