MULTIWAVELENGTH OBSERVATIONS OF A TeV-FLARE FROM W COMAE

Journal Article · Thu Dec 10 00:00:00 EST 2009 · Astrophysical Journal

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1088/0004-637X/707/1/612· OSTI ID:21389282

Acciari, V A; Benbow, W ^[1]; Aliu, E; Boltuch, D ^[2]; Aune, T ^[3]; Beilicke, M; Buckley, J H; Bugaev, V; Dickherber, R ^[4]; Boettcher, M ^[5]; Bradbury, S M ^[6]; Byrum, K ^[7]; Cannon, A ^[8]; Cesarini, A ^[9]; Ciupik, L ^[10]; Cogan, P ^[11]; Cui, W; Finley, J P ^[12]; Duke, C ^[13]; Falcone, A ^[14]

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1. Fred Lawrence Whipple Observatory, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Amado, AZ 85645 (United States)
2. Department of Physics and Astronomy and the Bartol Research Institute, University of Delaware, Newark, DE 19716 (United States)
3. Santa Cruz Institute for Particle Physics and Department of Physics, University of California, Santa Cruz, CA 95064 (United States)
4. Department of Physics, Washington University, St. Louis, MO 63130 (United States)
5. Astrophysical Institute, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Ohio University, Athens, OH 45701 (United States)
6. School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Leeds, Leeds LS2 9JT (United Kingdom)
7. Argonne National Laboratory, 9700 S. Cass Avenue, Argonne, IL 60439 (United States)
8. School of Physics, University College Dublin, Belfield, Dublin 4 (Ireland)
9. School of Physics, National University of Ireland, Galway (Ireland)
10. Astronomy Department, Adler Planetarium and Astronomy Museum, Chicago, IL 60605 (United States)
11. Physics Department, McGill University, Montreal, QC H3A 2T8 (Canada)
12. Department of Physics, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 47907 (United States)
13. Department of Physics, Grinnell College, Grinnell, IA 50112-1690 (United States)
14. Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, 525 Davey Lab, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802 (United States)

We report results from an intensive multiwavelength campaign on the intermediate-frequency-peaked BL Lacertae object W Com (z = 0.102) during a strong outburst of very high energy gamma-ray emission in 2008 June. The very high energy gamma-ray signal was detected by VERITAS on 2008 June 7-8 with a flux F(>200 GeV) =(5.7 +- 0.6) x 10{sup -11} cm{sup -2} s{sup -1}, about three times brighter than during the discovery of gamma-ray emission from W Com by VERITAS in 2008 March. The initial detection of this flare by VERITAS at energies above 200 GeV was followed by observations in high-energy gamma rays (AGILE; E {sub g}amma>= 100 MeV), X-rays (Swift and XMM-Newton), and at UV, and ground-based optical and radio monitoring through the GASP-WEBT consortium and other observatories. Here we describe the multiwavelength data and derive the spectral energy distribution of the source from contemporaneous data taken throughout the flare.

• OSTI ID: 21389282
• Journal Information: Astrophysical Journal, Vol. 707, Issue 1; Other Information: DOI: 10.1088/0004-637X/707/1/612; ISSN 0004-637X
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS
79 ASTROPHYSICS
COSMOLOGY AND ASTRONOMY
BL LACERTAE OBJECTS
ENERGY SPECTRA
GAMMA RADIATION
GEV RANGE 100-1000
PHOTON EMISSION
TEV RANGE
COSMIC RADIO SOURCES
ELECTROMAGNETIC RADIATION
EMISSION
ENERGY RANGE
GEV RANGE
IONIZING RADIATIONS
RADIATIONS
SPECTRA