2015/08/14 by S. Coutinõ de León, De León, Sara Coutiño, Alberto Carramiñana Alonso +3
Physics and Astronomy · #Astrophysics and Cosmic Phenomena #Dark Matter and Cosmic Phenomena #FOS: Physical sciences #Galaxies: Formation, Evolution, Phenomena #High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena (astro-ph.HE)
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1508.03577
openalex publication_date 2015/08/14 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
The extragalactic background light (EBL) is all the electromagnetic energy released by resolved and unresolved extragalactic sources since the recombination era. Its intensity and spectral shape provide information about the evolution of galaxies throughout cosmic history. Since direct observations of the EBL are very difficult to perform, the study of the interaction between the low energy EBL photons and high energy photons from distant extragalactic sources becomes relevant to constrain the EBL intensity. The main goal of this study is to investigate the opacity of the EBL to gamma rays by observing a sample of active galaxies nuclei (AGN) with the High Altitude Water Cherenkov (HAWC) Gamma-Ray Observatory. Current gamma-ray observations up to 20 TeV performed by Imaging Atmospheric Cherenkov Telescopes (IACTs) have constrained the EBL intensity in the 0.1-50 μm region. HAWC, which monitors the gamma-ray sky in the 100 GeV to 100 TeV energy range, will be able to detect about 10 AGN with the first year of HAWC data based on the extrapolation of steady-state spectra from the GeV band to TeV, and thus constrain the EBL in the poorly-measured 1-100 μm range.