2018/03/20 by C. Pittori, F. Lucarelli, F. Verrecchia +45
Earth and Planetary Sciences · Physics and Astronomy · #Astrophysics and Cosmic Phenomena #Blazar #Earth Systems and Cosmic Evolution #Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope #Flare #Gamma-ray bursts and supernovae #Polarization (electrochemistry) #Solar flare #Spectral energy distribution #astro-ph.HE
paper · pdf · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/aab1f9
13 pages, 5 figures,5 Tables. Accepted for publication in ApJ
arxiv created 2018/03/20 · openalex publication_date 2018/03/28 · openalex created_date 2018/03/29 · arxiv updated 2018/04/11 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/06
Abstract We report the AGILE detection and the results of the multifrequency follow-up observations of a bright γ -ray flare of the blazar 3C 279 in 2015 June. We use AGILE and Fermi gamma-ray data, together with Swift X-ray andoptical-ultraviolet data, and ground-based GASP-WEBT optical observations, including polarization information, to study the source variability and the overall spectral energy distribution during the γ -ray flare. The γ -ray flaring data, compared with as yet unpublished simultaneous optical data that will allow constraints on the big blue bump disk luminosity, show very high Compton dominance values of ∼100, with the ratio of γ -ray to optical emission rising by a factor of three in a few hours. The multiwavelength behavior of the source during the flare challenges one-zone leptonic theoretical models. The new observations during the 2015 June flare are also compared with already published data and nonsimultaneous historical 3C 279 archival data.