The Interplay between accelerated Protons, X-rays and Neutrinos in the Corona of NGC 1068: Constraints from Kinetic Plasma Simulations
Autor: | Mbarek, Rostom, Philippov, Alexander, Chernoglazov, Alexander, Levinson, Amir, Mushotzky, Richard |
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Rok vydání: | 2023 |
Předmět: | |
Zdroj: | Phys. Rev. D 109, L101306 Published 24 May 2024 |
Druh dokumentu: | Working Paper |
DOI: | 10.1103/PhysRevD.109.L101306 |
Popis: | We examine properties of accelerated protons potentially responsible for the neutrino excess observed in the direction of NGC 1068, using constraints from kinetic Particle-in-Cell (PIC) simulations. We find that i) coronal X-rays and Optical/Ultra-Violet light in the inner disk lead to efficient absorption of hadronic $\gamma$-rays within 100 Schwarzschild radii from the black hole; ii) protons accelerated from the coronal thermal pool cannot account for the observed neutrinos; and iii) explaining the observed signal requires an injection of protons with a hard spectrum, peaking at $\gamma_p\sim 10^3-10^4$, into the turbulent magnetically-dominated corona, where they are confined and re-accelerated. The resulting neutrino signal can be consistent with IceCube observations. In our most favorable scenario, the injected protons are pre-accelerated in intermittent current sheets in the vicinity of the black hole, occurring either at the boundary between the disk and the outflow or during magnetic flux eruption events. Comment: 11 pages with 8 figures, along with Supplementary Material; Accepted |
Databáze: | arXiv |
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