No Arabic abstract
We study constraints on the population of neutrino emitting blazars imposed by the absence of doublets in astrophysical muon neutrino signal and z>0.3 redshift of nearest identified neutrino-emitting blazar (an order of magnitude further away than the nearest gamma-ray emitting blazar). We show that in spite of the absence of correlation of neutrino arrival directions with positions of gamma-ray emitting blazars, cumulative blazar flux could explain most of astrophysical neutrino flux measured in muon neutrino channel. This is possible if the population of neutrino emitting blazars has experienced rapid positive evolution at least as (1+z)^5 at z< 1. Such a model avoids previously derived constraint on the low level of blazar contribution to extragalactic neutrino flux because gamma-ray and neutrino fluxes are dominated by different sets of blazars. Rapid evolution of neutrino emitting blazars could be explained by the fact that only high luminosity blazars hosting radiatively efficient accretion flows are efficient neutrino sources.
Motivated by the recently reported evidence of an association between a high-energy neutrino and a gamma-ray flare from the blazar TXS 0506+056, we calculate the expected high-energy neutrino signal from past, individual flares, from twelve blazars, selected in declinations favourable for detection with IceCube. To keep the number of free parameters to a minimum, we mainly focus on BL Lac objects and assume the synchrotron self-Compton mechanism produces the bulk of the high-energy emission. We consider a broad range of the allowed parameter space for the efficiency of proton acceleration, the proton content of BL Lac jets, and the presence of external photon fields. To model the expected neutrino fluence we use simultaneous multi-wavelength observations. We find that in the absence of external photon fields and with jet proton luminosity normalised to match the observed production rate of ultra-high-energy cosmic rays, individual flaring sources produce a modest neutrino flux in IceCube, $lesssim10^{-3}$ muon neutrinos with energy exceeding 100 TeV, stacking ten years of flare periods selected in the >800 MeV Fermi energy range from each source. Under optimistic assumptions about the jet proton luminosity and in the presence of external photon fields, we find that the two most powerful sources in our sample, AO 0235+164, and OJ 287, would produce, in total, $approx 3$ muon neutrinos during ten years of Fermi flaring periods, in future neutrino detectors with total instrumented volume $sim$ten times larger than IceCube,or otherwise, constrain the proton luminosity of blazar jets.
The potential association between the blazar TXS 0506+056 and the neutrino event IceCube-170922A provides a unique opportunity to study the possible physical connection between the high-energy photons and neutrinos. We explore the correlated electromagnetic and neutrino emissions of blazar TXS 0506+056 by a self-consistent leptonic-hadronic model, taking into account particle stochastic acceleration and all relevant radiative processes self-consistently. The electromagnetic and neutrino spectra of blazar TXS 0506+056 are reproduced by the proton synchrotron and hybrid leptonic-hadronic models based on the proton-photon interactions. It is found that the hybrid leptonic-hadronic model can be used to better explain the observed X-ray and $gamma$-ray spectra of blazar TXS 0506+056 than the proton synchrotron model. Moreover, the predicted neutrino spectrum of the hybrid leptonic-hadronic model is closer to the observed one compared to the proton synchrotron model. We suggest that the hybrid leptonic-hadronic model is more favored if the neutrino event IceCube-170922A is associated with the blazar TXS 0506+056.
The IceCube collaboration reported a $sim 3.5sigma$ excess of $13pm5$ neutrino events in the direction of the blazar TXS 0506+56 during a $sim$6 month period in 2014-2015, as well as the ($sim3sigma$) detection of a high-energy muon neutrino during an electromagnetic flare in 2017. We explore the possibility that the 2014-2015 neutrino excess and the 2017 multi-messenger flare are both explained in a common physical framework that relies on the emergence of a relativistic neutral beam in the blazar jet due to interactions of accelerated cosmic rays (CRs) with photons. We demonstrate that the neutral beam model provides an explanation for the 2014-2015 neutrino excess without violating X-ray and $gamma$-ray constraints, and also yields results consistent with the detection of one high-energy neutrino during the 2017 flare. If both neutrino associations with TXS 05065+056 are real, our model requires that (i) the composition of accelerated CRs is light, with a ratio of helium nuclei to protons $gtrsim5$, (ii) a luminous external photon field ($sim 10^{46}$ erg s$^{-1}$) variable (on year-long timescales) is present, and (iii) the CR injection luminosity as well as the properties of the dissipation region (i.e., Lorentz factor, magnetic field, and size) vary on year-long timescales.
The IceCube neutrino discovery was punctuated by three showers with $E_ u$ ~ 1-2 PeV. Interest is intense in possible fluxes at higher energies, though a marked deficit of $E_ u$ ~ 6 PeV Glashow resonance events implies a spectrum that is soft and/or cutoff below ~few PeV. However, IceCube recently reported a through-going track event depositing 2.6 $pm$ 0.3 PeV. A muon depositing so much energy can imply $E_{ u_mu} gtrsim$ 10 PeV. We show that extending the soft $E_ u^{-2.6}$ spectral fit from TeV-PeV data is unlikely to yield such an event. Alternatively, a tau can deposit this much energy, though requiring $E_{ u_tau}$ ~10x higher. We find that either scenario hints at a new flux, with the hierarchy of $ u_mu$ and $ u_tau$ energies suggesting a window into astrophysical neutrinos at $E_ u$ ~ 100 PeV if a tau. We address implications, including for ultrahigh-energy cosmic-ray and neutrino origins.
Recent detection of the neutrino event, IceCube-170922A by IceCube observatory from the Blazar TXS 0506+056 in the state of enhanced gamma ray emission indicates for acceleration of cosmic rays in the blazar jet. The non-detection of the broadline emission in the optical spectrum of TXS 0506+056 and other BL Lac objects suggests that external photons emissions are weak and hence photo-meson (p-gamma) interaction may not be a favored mechanism for high energy neutrino production. The lack of broadline signatures also creates doubt about the presence of a high density cloud in the vicinity of the super-massive black hole (SMBH) of TXS 0506+056 and consequently raised question on hadronuclear (pp) interaction interpretation like relativistic jet meets with high density cloud. Here we demonstrate that non-relativistic protons in the proton blazar model, those come into existence under charge neutrality condition of the blazar jet, offer sufficient target matter for pp-interaction with shock accelerated protons and consequently the model can describe consistently the observed high energy gamma rays and neutrino signal from the blazar TXS 0506+056.