Search

The interactions between jets from active galactic nuclei (AGN) and their stellar environments significantly influence jet dynamics and emission characteristics. In low-power jets, such as those in Fanaroff-Riley I (FR I) galaxies, the jet-star interactions can notably affect jet deceleration and energy dissipation. Recent numerical studies suggest that mass loading from stellar winds is a key factor in decelerating jets, accounting for many observed characteristics in FR I jets. Additionally, a radio-optical positional offset has been observed, with optical emission detected further down the jet than radio emission. This observation may challenge traditional explanations based solely on recollimation shocks and instabilities. This work utilizes the radiative transfer code RIPTIDE to generate synthetic synchrotron maps, from a population of re-accelerated electrons, in both radio and optical bands from jet simulations incorporating various mass-loading profiles and distributions of gas and stars within the ambient medium. Our findings emphasize the importance of mass entrainment in replicating the extended and diffuse radio/optical emissions observed in FR I jets and explaining the radio-optical offsets. These offsets are influenced by the galaxy's physical properties, the surrounding stellar populations, and observational biases. We successfully reproduce typical radio-optical offsets by considering a mass-load equivalent to $10^{-9}~M_\odot \cdot \rm{yr}^{-1} \cdot \rm{pc}^{-3}$. Overall, our results demonstrate that positive offset measurements are a promising tool for revealing the fundamental properties of galaxies and potentially their stellar populations, particularly in the context of FR I jets., Comment: 13 pages, 8 figures

We propose a method to accurately handle fluorescence in a non-spectral (\eg, tristimulus) rendering engine, showcasing color-shifting and increased luminance effects. Core to our method is a principled reduction technique that encodes the re-radiation into a low-dimensional matrix working in the space of the renderer's Color Matching Functions (CMFs). Our process is independent of a specific CMF set and allows for the addition of a non-visible ultraviolet band during light transport. Our representation visually matches full spectral light transport for measured fluorescent materials even for challenging illuminants., Comment: 9 pages, 9 figures

We study holographic entanglement entropy and revisit thermodynamics and confinement in the dilaton-gravity system. Our analysis focuses on a solvable class of backgrounds that includes AdS and linear dilaton spacetimes as particular cases, with some results extended to general warped metrics. A general lesson is that the behavior of the holographic theory is tied to the bulk curvature singularities. We find that a singular background is confining if and only if i) the singularity coincides with a boundary or ii) it is the linear dilaton. In the former case, for which the singularity cuts off spacetime, we demonstrate that both entanglement entropy and thermodynamics exhibit a first order phase transition. In the linear dilaton case we find instead that both entanglement entropy and thermal phase transitions are of second order. Additionally, along the process we thoroughly derive the radion effective action at quadratic order., Comment: 43 pages, 8 figures, 1 table

We compute the four-photon ($F^4$) operators generated by loops of charged particles of spin $0$, $\frac{1}{2}$, $1$ in the presence of gravity and in any spacetime dimension $d$. To this end, we expand the one-loop effective action via the heat kernel coefficients, which provide both the gravity-induced renormalization of the $F^4$ operators and the low-energy Einstein-Maxwell effective field theory (EFT) produced by massive charged particles. We set positivity bounds on the $F^4$ operators using standard arguments from extremal black holes (for $d\geq 4$) and from infrared (IR) consistency of four-photon scattering (for $d\geq 3$). In the latter we assume that the graviton $t$-channel pole may be discarded, an assumption supported by the near equivalence with the black hole bound for any $d\geq 4$. Reduction of the operator basis is achieved using that the Gauss-Bonnet combination vanishes at quadratic order for any $d$. The positivity bounds constrain the charge-to-mass ratio of the heavy particles. If the Planckian $F^4$ operators are sufficiently small or negative, such bounds produce a version of the $d$-dimensional Weak Gravity Conjecture (WGC) in most but not all dimensions. In $d=9,10$, it turns out that the WGC fails to imply extremal black hole decay in the infrared EFT, making mandatory the existence of sufficiently large Planckian $F^4$ operators. In the special case of $d=6$, we find that the gravity-induced beta functions of $F^4$ operators from charged particles of any spin are positive. This implies that, surprisingly, the EFT of massless charged particles is apparently infrared-inconsistent in $d=6$. In the massive $d=6$ case, consistency is restored by WGC-like bounds that are logarithmically enhanced., Comment: 49 pages, 5 figures, v2: results extended with bounds from extremal black hole decay, conclusions unchanged. Text extended, appendix added, minor changes for clarity, references added

Light particles quadratically coupled to nucleons induce macroscopic forces in matter. While a quantum effect always exists, an additional force occurs in the presence of a finite density of the light particles. We compute and classify such background-induced forces for particles of spin $0,\frac{1}{2},1$ in the framework of effective field theory. We show that, at short distance, the background-induced forces exhibit a universal behavior that depends solely on the moments of the phase space distribution function of the light particles. We compute the forces in the case of dark particles densities that may realistically occur in cosmology, assuming either cosmically homogeneous or virialized phase space distributions. For homogeneous distributions -- analogous to cosmic neutrinos, all the background-induced forces remain, unlike the quantum ones, exponentially unsuppressed at large distance, implying that large scale fifth force experiments are highly sensitive to dark relics. Moreover at zero mass the forces from dark bosons are generically enhanced with respect to their quantum counterpart due to Bose-Einstein distribution. Overall, we find that the resulting fifth force bounds can compete with those from quantum forces. For virialized distributions -- identifiable as cold dark matter, the reach is also enhanced beyond the dark matter Compton wavelength. We obtain significant bounds on sub-keV scalar cold dark matter, that can appear in certain cosmological scenarios. A thorough adaptation of the results from the E\"ot-Wash experiment may produce powerful additional bounds., Comment: 44 pages, 7 figures. v2: Includes extra results on cold dark matter and anisotropy. Matches journal version

Context. The galactic winds of starburst galaxies (SBGs) give rise to remarkable structures on kiloparsec scales. However, the evolution and shape of these giant wind bubbles, as well as the properties of the shocks they develop, are not yet fully understood. Aims. We aim to understand what shapes the galactic winds of SBGs, with a particular focus on the role of large-scale magnetic fields in the dynamical evolution of galactic wind-inflated bubbles. In addition, we aim to explore where the conditions for efficient particle acceleration are met in these systems. Methods. We performed magnetohydrodynamic simulations with the AMRVAC code (Adaptive Mesh Refinement Versatile Advection Code) with various configurations of the galactic medium density profile and magnetization. Results. We observe that the large-scale magnetic field, in which galactic winds expand, can impact the structure and evolution of inflated bubbles. However, the typical structures observed in starburst galaxies, such as M82, cannot be solely explained by the magnetic field structures that have been considered. This highlights the importance of other factors, such as the galactic disk, in shaping the galactic bubble. Furthermore, in all the magnetized cases we investigated, the forward wave resulting from the expanding bubbles only results in compression waves, whereas the wind termination shock features high Mach numbers, making it a promising site for diffusive shock acceleration up to $\sim 10^{2}$ PeV. The synthetic X-ray images generated from our models reveal an envelope surrounding the bubbles that extends up to 2 kpc, which could correspond to the polarized emission observed from planar geometry in M82, as well as a large structure inside the bubble corresponding to the shocked galactic wind., Comment: 17 pages

We present the AM$^3$ ("Astrophysical Multi-Messenger Modeling") software. AM$^3$ is a documented open source software that efficiently solves the coupled integro-differential equations describing the temporal evolution of the spectral densities of particles interacting in astrophysical environments, in-cluding photons, electrons, positrons, protons, neutrons, pions, muons, and neutrinos. The software has been extensively used to simulate the multi-wavelength and neutrino emission from active galactic nuclei (including blazars), gamma-ray bursts, and tidal disruption events. The simulations include all relevant non-thermal processes, namely synchrotron emission, inverse Compton scattering, photon-photon annihilation, proton-proton and proton-photon pion production, and photo-pair production. The software self-consistently calculates the full cascade of primary and secondary particles, including non-linear feedback processes and predictions in the time domain. It also allows to track separately the particle densities produced by means of each distinct interaction processes, including the different hadronic channels. With its efficient hybrid solver combining analytical and numerical techniques, AM$^3$ combines efficiency and accuracy at a user-adjustable level. We describe the technical details of the numerical framework and present three examples of applications to different astrophysical environments., Comment: The BSD-licensed source code can be found under https://gitlab.desy.de/am3/am3, for the user guide and documentation see https://am3.readthedocs.io/en/latest/

We investigate the quantum forces occurring between the defects and/or boundaries of a conformal field theory (CFT). We propose to model imperfect defects and boundaries as localized relevant double-trace operators that deform the CFT. Our focus is on pointlike and codimension-one planar defects. In the case of two parallel membranes, we point out that the CFT 2-point function tends to get confined and develops a tower of resonances with constant decay rate when the operator dimension approaches the free field dimension. Using a functional formalism, we compute the quantum forces induced by the CFT between a variety of configurations of pointlike defects, infinite plates and membranes. Consistency arguments imply that these quantum forces are attractive at any distance. Forces of Casimir-Polder type appear in the UV, while forces of Casimir type appear in the IR, in which case the CFT gets repelled from the defects. Most of the forces behave as a non-integer power of the separation, controlled by the dimension of the double-trace deformation. In the Casimir regime of the membrane-membrane configuration, the quantum pressure behaves universally as $1/\ell^d$, however information about the double-trace nature of the defects still remains encoded in the strength of the pressure., Comment: 27 pages, 3 figures. Invited paper to the Special Issue of the Journal Physics: 75 Years of the Casimir Effect. v2: references added, matches journal version

We study a solvable class of five-dimensional dilaton gravity models that continuously interpolate between anti-de Sitter (AdS$_5$), linear dilaton (LD$_5$) and positively curved spacetimes as a function of a continuous parameter $\nu$. The dilaton vacuum expectation value is set by a potential localized on a flat brane. We chart the elementary properties of these backgrounds for any admissible $\nu$, and determine stability conditions of the brane-dilaton system. We find that the spectrum of metric fluctuations can be either continuous or discrete. It features a massless graviton mode confined between the brane and the curvature singularity, and a massive radion mode tied to brane-dilaton stability. We show that, in the presence of a bulk black hole, the holographic theory living on the brane features a perfect fluid. The equation of state of the holographic fluid interpolates between radiation, pressureless matter and vacuum energy as a function of $\nu$. This extends earlier findings on holographic fluids. Our results suggest that the thermodynamics of the fluid mirrors precisely the thermodynamics of the bulk black hole., Comment: 27 pages. v2: Minor edits, references added. Added appendices revisiting gauge fixing and the graviton quadratic action in warped extra dimensions

Gamma-ray observations have established energetic isolated pulsars as outstanding particle accelerators and antimatter factories in the Galaxy. There is, however, no consensus regarding the acceleration mechanisms and the radiative processes at play, nor the locations where these take place. The spectra of all observed gamma-ray pulsars to date show strong cutoffs or a break above energies of a few gigaelectronvolt (GeV). Using the H.E.S.S. array of Cherenkov telescopes, we discovered a novel radiation component emerging beyond this generic GeV cutoff in the Vela pulsar's broadband spectrum. The extension of gamma-ray pulsation energies up to at least 20 teraelectronvolts (TeV) shows that Vela pulsar can accelerate particles to Lorentz factors higher than $4\times10^7$. This is an order of magnitude larger than in the case of the Crab pulsar, the only other pulsar detected in the TeV energy range. Our results challenge the state-of-the-art models for high-energy emission of pulsars while providing a new probe, i.e. the energetic multi-TeV component, for constraining the acceleration and emission processes in their extreme energy limit., Comment: 38 pages, 6 figures. This preprint has not undergone peer review or any post-submission improvements or corrections. The Version of Record of this article is published in Nature Astronomy, Nat Astron (2023), and is available online at https://doi.org/10.1038/s41550-023-02052-3

Recent observations are shedding light on the important role that active galactic nuclei (AGN) play in the production of high-energy neutrinos. In this study, we focus on one object, 5BZB J0630-2406, which is among the blazars recently proposed as associated with neutrino emission during the first 7-yr IceCube observations. Modelling the quasi-simultaneous, broad-band spectral energy distribution, we explore various scenarios from purely leptonic to lepto-hadronic models, testing the inclusion of external photon fields. This theoretical study provides a complementary testing ground for the proposed neutrino-blazar association. Despite being historically classified as a BL Lac, our study shows that 5BZB J0630-2406 belongs to the relatively rare sub-class of high-power flat-spectrum radio quasars (FSRQs). Our results indicate that interactions between protons and external radiation fields can produce a neutrino flux that is within the reach of the IceCube detector. Furthermore, the spectral shape of the X-ray emission suggests the imprint of hadronic processes related to very energetic protons., Comment: Accepted for publication. 18 pages, 10 figures

The linear dilaton background is the keystone of a string-derived holographic correspondence beyond AdS$_{d+1}$/CFT$_d$. This motivates an exploration of the $(d+1)$-dimensional linear dilaton spacetime (LD$_{d+1}$) and its holographic properties from the low-energy viewpoint. We first notice that the LD$_{d+1}$ space has simple conformal symmetries, that we use to shape an effective field theory (EFT) on the LD background. We then place a brane in the background to study holography at the level of quantum fields and gravity. We find that the holographic correlators from the EFT feature a pattern of singularities at certain kinematic thresholds. We argue that such singularities can be used to bootstrap the putative $d$-dimensional dual theory using techniques analogous to those of the Cosmological Bootstrap program. Turning on finite temperature, we study the holographic fluid emerging on the brane in the presence of a bulk black hole. We find that the holographic fluid is pressureless for any $d$ due to a cancellation between Weyl curvature and dilaton stress tensor, and verify consistency with the time evolution of the theory. From the fluid thermodynamics, we find a universal temperature and Hagedorn behavior for any $d$. This matches the properties of a CFT$_2$ with large $T\overline T$ deformation, and of little string theory for $d=6$. Both the fluid equation of state and the spectrum of quantum fluctuations suggest that the $d$-dimensional dual theory arising from LD$_{d+1}$ is generically gapped., Comment: 40+11 pages, 3 figures

We examine the Abelian Higgs model in (d+1)-dimensional anti-de Sitter space with an ultraviolet brane. The gauge symmetry is broken by a bulk Higgs vacuum expectation value triggered on the brane. We propose two separate Goldstone boson equivalence theorems for the boundary and bulk degrees of freedom. We compute the holographic self-energy of the gauge field and show that its spectrum is either a continuum, gapped continuum, or a discretuum as a function of the Higgs bulk mass. When the Higgs has no bulk mass, the AdS isometries are unbroken. We find in that case that the dual CFT has a non-conserved U(1) current whose anomalous dimension is proportional to the square of the Higgs vacuum expectation value. When the Higgs background weakly breaks the AdS isometries, we present an adapted WKB method to solve the gauge field equations. We show that the U(1) current dimension runs logarithmically with the energy scale in accordance with a nearly-marginal U(1)-breaking deformation of the CFT., Comment: 34 pages + 2 appendices + references; 4 figures. This version: matches published version, includes an appendix on an exact gravitational back-reaction

We report on multiwavelength target-of-opportunity observations of the blazar PKS 0735+178, located 2.2$^\circ$ away from the best-fit position of the IceCube neutrino event IceCube-211208A detected on December 8, 2021. The source was in a high-flux state in the optical, ultraviolet, X-ray, and GeV gamma-ray bands around the time of the neutrino event, exhibiting daily variability in the soft X-ray flux. The X-ray data from Swift-XRT and NuSTAR characterize the transition between the low-energy and high-energy components of the broadband spectral energy distribution (SED), and the gamma-ray data from Fermi -LAT, VERITAS, and H.E.S.S. require a spectral cut-off near 100 GeV. Both X-ray and gamma-ray measurements provide strong constraints on the leptonic and hadronic models. We analytically explore a synchrotron self-Compton model, an external Compton model, and a lepto-hadronic model. Models that are entirely based on internal photon fields face serious difficulties in matching the observed SED. The existence of an external photon field in the source would instead explain the observed gamma-ray spectral cut-off in both leptonic and lepto-hadronic models and allow a proton jet power that marginally agrees with the Eddington limit in the lepto-hadronic model. We show a numerical lepto-hadronic model with external target photons that reproduces the observed SED and is reasonably consistent with the neutrino event despite requiring a high jet power., Comment: 21 pages, 3 figures, accepted by ApJ

Magnetic fields in galaxies and galaxy clusters are believed to be the result of the amplification of intergalactic seed fields during the formation of large-scale structures in the universe. However, the origin, strength, and morphology of this intergalactic magnetic field (IGMF) remain unknown. Lower limits on (or indirect detection of) the IGMF can be obtained from observations of high-energy gamma rays from distant blazars. Gamma rays interact with the extragalactic background light to produce electron-positron pairs, which can subsequently initiate electromagnetic cascades. The $\gamma$-ray signature of the cascade depends on the IGMF since it deflects the pairs. Here we report on a new search for this cascade emission using a combined data set from the Fermi Large Area Telescope and the High Energy Stereoscopic System. Using state-of-the-art Monte Carlo predictions for the cascade signal, our results place a lower limit on the IGMF of $B > 7.1\times10^{-16}$ G for a coherence length of 1 Mpc even when blazar duty cycles as short as 10 yr are assumed. This improves on previous lower limits by a factor of 2. For longer duty cycles of $10^4$ ($10^7$) yr, IGMF strengths below $1.8\times10^{-14}$ G ($3.9\times10^{-14}$ G) are excluded, which rules out specific models for IGMF generation in the early universe., Comment: 20 pages, 7 figures, 4 tables. Accepted for publication in ApJ Letters. Auxiliary data is provided in electronic format at https://zenodo.org/record/8014311

Identifying the astrophysical sources responsible for the high-energy cosmic neutrinos has been a longstanding challenge. In a previous work, we report evidence for a spatial correlation between blazars from the 5th Roma-BZCat catalog and neutrino data of the highest detectable energies, i.e. >0.1 PeV, collected by the IceCube Observatory in the southern celestial hemisphere. The statistical significance is found at the level of 2 x 10^{-6} post-trial. In this work we test whether a similar correlation exists in the northern hemisphere, were IceCube is mostly sensitive to <0.1 PeV energies. We find a consistent correlation between blazars and northern neutrino data at the pre-trial p-value of 5.12 x 10^{-4}, and a post-trial chance probability of 6.79 x 10^{-3}. Combining the post-trial probabilities observed for the southern and northern experiments yields a global post-trial chance probability of 2.59 x 10^{-7} for the genuineness of such correlation. This implies that the spatial correlation is highly unlikely to arise by chance. Our studies push forward an all-sky subset of 52 objects as highly likely PeVatron extragalactic accelerators., Comment: Under review, feedback welcome

The origin of the gamma-ray emission from M87 is currently a matter of debate. This work aims to localize the VHE (100 GeV-100 TeV) gamma-ray emission from M87 and probe a potential extended hadronic emission component in the inner Virgo Cluster. The search for a steady and extended gamma-ray signal around M87 can constrain the cosmic-ray energy density and the pressure exerted by the cosmic rays onto the intra-cluster medium, and allow us to investigate the role of the cosmic rays in the active galactic nucleus feedback as a heating mechanism in the Virgo Cluster. H.E.S.S. telescopes are sensitive to VHE gamma rays and have been utilized to observe M87 since 2004. We utilized a Bayesian block analysis to identify M87 emission states with H.E.S.S. observations from 2004 until 2021, dividing them into low, intermediate, and high states. Because of the causality argument, an extended ($\gtrsim$kpc) signal is allowed only in steady emission states. Hence, we fitted the morphology of the 120h low state data and found no significant gamma-ray extension. Therefore, we derived for the low state an upper limit of 58"(corresponding to $\approx$4.6kpc) in the extension of a single-component morphological model described by a rotationally symmetric 2D Gaussian model at 99.7% confidence level. Our results exclude the radio lobes ($\approx$30 kpc) as the principal component of the VHE gamma-ray emission from the low state of M87. The gamma-ray emission is compatible with a single emission region at the radio core of M87. These results, with the help of two multiple-component models, constrain the maximum cosmic-ray to thermal pressure ratio $X_{{CR,max.}}$$\lesssim$$0.32$ and the total energy in cosmic-ray protons (CRp) to $U_{CR}$$\lesssim$5$\times10^{58}$ erg in the inner 20kpc of the Virgo Cluster for an assumed CRp power-law distribution in momentum with spectral index $\alpha_{p}$=2.1., Comment: 15 pages, 7 figures. Accepted for publication in A&A. Corresponding authors: Victor Barbosa Martins, Stefan Ohm, Cornelia Arcaro, Natalia \.Zywucka, Mathieu de Naurois

Geminga is an enigmatic radio-quiet gamma-ray pulsar located at a mere 250 pc distance from Earth. Extended very-high-energy gamma-ray emission around the pulsar was discovered by Milagro and later confirmed by HAWC, which are both water Cherenkov detector-based experiments. However, evidence for the Geminga pulsar wind nebula in gamma rays has long evaded detection by imaging atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes (IACTs) despite targeted observations. The detection of gamma-ray emission on angular scales > 2 deg poses a considerable challenge for the background estimation in IACT data analysis. With recent developments in understanding the complementary background estimation techniques of water Cherenkov and atmospheric Cherenkov instruments, the H.E.S.S. IACT array can now confirm the detection of highly extended gamma-ray emission around the Geminga pulsar with a radius of at least 3 deg in the energy range 0.5-40 TeV. We find no indications for statistically significant asymmetries or energy-dependent morphology. A flux normalisation of $(2.8\pm0.7)\times10^{-12}$ cm$^{-2}$s$^{-1}$TeV$^{-1}$ at 1 TeV is obtained within a 1 deg radius region around the pulsar. To investigate the particle transport within the halo of energetic leptons around the pulsar, we fitted an electron diffusion model to the data. The normalisation of the diffusion coefficient obtained of $D_0 = 7.6^{+1.5}_{-1.2} \times 10^{27}$ cm$^2$s$^{-1}$, at an electron energy of 100 TeV, is compatible with values previously reported for the pulsar halo around Geminga, which is considerably below the Galactic average., Comment: 16 pages, 15 figures, 7 tables. Accepted for publication in Astronomy & Astrophysics

Primordial Black Holes (PBHs) are hypothetical black holes predicted to have been formed from density fluctuations in the early Universe. PBHs with an initial mass around $10^{14}-10^{15}$g are expected to end their evaporation at present times in a burst of particles and very-high-energy (VHE) gamma rays. Those gamma rays may be detectable by the High Energy Stereoscopic System (H.E.S.S.), an array of imaging atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes. This paper reports on the search for evaporation bursts of VHE gamma rays with H.E.S.S., ranging from 10 to 120 seconds, as expected from the final stage of PBH evaporation and using a total of 4816 hours of observations. The most constraining upper limit on the burst rate of local PBHs is $2000$ pc$^{-3}$ yr$^{-1}$ for a burst interval of 120 seconds, at the 95\% confidence level. The implication of these measurements for PBH dark matter are also discussed., Comment: Accepted for publication in JCAP, corresponding authors: F.Brun, J-F. Glicenstein, V. Marandon, T. Tavernier

GRB221009A is the brightest gamma-ray burst ever detected. To probe the very-high-energy (VHE, $>$\!100 GeV) emission, the High Energy Stereoscopic System (H.E.S.S.) began observations 53 hours after the triggering event, when the brightness of the moonlight no longer precluded observations. We derive differential and integral upper limits using H.E.S.S. data from the third, fourth, and ninth nights after the initial GRB detection, after applying atmospheric corrections. The combined observations yield an integral energy flux upper limit of $\Phi_\mathrm{UL}^{95\%} = 9.7 \times 10^{-12}~\mathrm{erg\,cm^{-2}\,s^{-1}}$ above $E_\mathrm{thr} = 650$ GeV. The constraints derived from the H.E.S.S. observations complement the available multiwavelength data. The radio to X-ray data are consistent with synchrotron emission from a single electron population, with the peak in the SED occurring above the X-ray band. Compared to the VHE-bright GRB190829A, the upper limits for GRB221009A imply a smaller gamma-ray to X-ray flux ratio in the afterglow. Even in the absence of a detection, the H.E.S.S. upper limits thus contribute to the multiwavelength picture of GRB221009A, effectively ruling out an IC dominated scenario., Comment: 10 pages, 4 figures. Accepted for publication in APJL. Corresponding authors: J. Damascene Mbarubucyeye, H. Ashkar, S. J. Zhu, B. Reville, F. Sch\"ussler

We study the cosmology of a three-brane in a specific five-dimensional scalar-gravity (i.e. soft-wall) background, known as the linear dilaton background. We discover that the Friedmann equation of the brane-world automatically contains a term mimicking pressureless matter. We propose to identify this term as dark matter. This dark matter arises as a projection of the bulk black hole on the brane, which contributes to the brane Friedmann equation via both the Weyl tensor and the scalar stress tensor. The nontrivial matter-like behavior is due to an exact cancellation between the Weyl and scalar pressures. We show that the Newtonian potential only receives a mild short-distance correction going as inverse distance squared, ensuring compatibility of the linear dilaton brane-world with observed 4D gravity. Our setup can be viewed as a consistent cosmological description of the holographic theories arising in the linear dilaton background. We also present more general scalar-gravity models where the brane cosmology features an effective energy density whose behavior smoothly interpolates between dark radiation, dark matter and dark energy depending on a model parameter., Comment: v2: 7 pages, 2 figures. Text improved, model in Sec. V.A. added, references added, matches journal version

MAXI J1820+070 is a low-mass X-ray binary with a black hole as a compact object. This binary underwent an exceptionally bright X-ray outburst from March to October 2018, showing evidence of a non-thermal particle population through its radio emission during this whole period. The combined results of 59.5 hours of observations of the MAXI J1820+070 outburst with the H.E.S.S., MAGIC and VERITAS experiments at energies above 200 GeV are presented, together with Fermi-LAT data between 0.1 and 500 GeV, and multiwavelength observations from radio to X-rays. Gamma-ray emission is not detected from MAXI J1820+070, but the obtained upper limits and the multiwavelength data allow us to put meaningful constraints on the source properties under reasonable assumptions regarding the non-thermal particle population and the jet synchrotron spectrum. In particular, it is possible to show that, if a high-energy gamma-ray emitting region is present during the hard state of the source, its predicted flux should be at most a factor of 20 below the obtained Fermi-LAT upper limits, and closer to them for magnetic fields significantly below equipartition. During the state transitions, under the plausible assumption that electrons are accelerated up to ~ 500 GeV, the multiwavelength data and the gamma-ray upper limits lead consistently to the conclusion that a potential high-energy and very-high-energy gamma-ray emitting region should be located at a distance from the black hole ranging between 10^11 and 10^13 cm. Similar outbursts from low-mass X-ray binaries might be detectable in the near future with upcoming instruments such as CTA., Comment: 15 pages, 5 figures. Accepted for publication in MNRAS

We examine effective field theories (EFTs) with a continuum sector in the presence of gravity. We first explain, via arguments based on central charge and species scale, that an EFT with a free continuum cannot consistently couple to standard (i.e. 4D Einstein) gravity. It follows that EFTs with a free or nearly-free continuum must either have a finite number of degrees of freedom or nonstandard gravity. The latter claim is realized for holographically-defined continuum models. We demonstrate this by computing the deviations from standard gravity in a specific 5D scalar-gravity system that gives rise to a gapped continuum (i.e the linear dilaton background). We find an $R^{-2}$ deviation from the Newtonian potential. At finite temperature we find an energy density with matter-like behavior in the brane Friedmann equation, holographically induced from the bulk geometry. Thus, remarkably, a brane-world living in the linear dilaton background automatically contains dark matter. We also present a slightly more evolved asymptotically-AdS linear dilaton model, for which the deviations exhibit a transition between AdS and linear dilaton behaviors., Comment: 47 pages, 4 figures, v2: Minor text edits for clarity, references added, models in Sec. 5 updated, appendices added

Young massive stellar clusters are extreme environments and potentially provide the means for efficient particle acceleration. Indeed, they are increasingly considered as being responsible for a significant fraction of cosmic rays (CRs) accelerated within the Milky Way. Westerlund 1, the most massive known young stellar cluster in our Galaxy is a prime candidate for studying this hypothesis. While the very-high-energy $\gamma$-ray source HESS J1646-458 has been detected in the vicinity of Westerlund 1 in the past, its association could not be firmly identified. We aim to identify the physical processes responsible for the $\gamma$-ray emission around Westerlund 1 and thus to better understand the role of massive stellar clusters in the acceleration of Galactic CRs. Using 164 hours of data recorded with the High Energy Stereoscopic System (H.E.S.S.), we carried out a deep spectromorphological study of the $\gamma$-ray emission of HESS J1646-458. We furthermore employed H I and CO observations of the region to infer the presence of gas that could serve as target material for interactions of accelerated CRs. We detected large-scale ($\sim 2^\circ$ diameter) $\gamma$-ray emission with a complex morphology, exhibiting a shell-like structure and showing no significant variation with $\gamma$-ray energy. The combined energy spectrum of the emission extends to several tens of TeV, and is uniform across the entire source region. We did not find a clear correlation of the $\gamma$-ray emission with gas clouds as identified through H I and CO observations. We conclude that, of the known objects within the region, only Westerlund 1 can explain the bulk of the $\gamma$-ray emission. Several CR acceleration sites and mechanisms are conceivable, and discussed in detail. (abridged), Comment: 15 pages, 9 figures. Corresponding authors: L. Mohrmann, S. Ohm, R. Rauth, A. Specovius. v2: corrected affiliation of M. Vecchi (still incorrect in journal version)

The central region of the Milky Way is one of the foremost locations to look for dark matter (DM) signatures. We report the first results on a search for DM particle annihilation signals using new observations from an unprecedented gamma-ray survey of the Galactic Center (GC) region, ${\it i.e.}$, the Inner Galaxy Survey, at very high energies ($\gtrsim$ 100 GeV) performed with the H.E.S.S. array of five ground-based Cherenkov telescopes. No significant gamma-ray excess is found in the search region of the 2014-2020 dataset and a profile likelihood ratio analysis is carried out to set exclusion limits on the annihilation cross section $\langle \sigma v\rangle$. Assuming Einasto and Navarro-Frenk-White (NFW) DM density profiles at the GC, these constraints are the strongest obtained so far in the TeV DM mass range. For the Einasto profile, the constraints reach $\langle \sigma v\rangle$ values of $\rm 3.7\times10^{-26} cm^3s^{-1}$ for 1.5 TeV DM mass in the $W^+W^-$ annihilation channel, and $\rm 1.2 \times 10^{-26} cm^3s^{-1}$ for 0.7 TeV DM mass in the $\tau^+\tau^-$ annihilation channel. With the H.E.S.S. Inner Galaxy Survey, ground-based $\gamma$-ray observations thus probe $\langle \sigma v\rangle$ values expected from thermal-relic annihilating TeV DM particles., Comment: Accepted in Phys. Rev. Lett., includes Supplemental materials. 5+10 pages, 2+8 figures, 4 tables

We study the LHC sensitivity to new broad neutral resonances produced in two-photon fusion and decaying to a top quark pair, $\gamma\gamma \to t\bar{t}$. This is probed in central exclusive $t\bar{t}$ production in proton-proton collisions, $pp \to p t\bar{t} p$. We use the tagging of the intact protons by PPS (CMS) and AFP (ATLAS) and consider the semi-leptonic $t\bar t$ channel. The sensitivity is also mapped onto a set of dimension-8 $\gamma\gamma t\bar{t}$ operators in the large mass limit. Using the kinematical correlations between the intact protons and the reconstructed $t\bar{t}$ system, we obtain a sensitivity to the couplings of the dimension-8 operators of $1.4 \cdot 10^{-11}~\mathrm{GeV}^{-4}$ at 95% CL. The sensitivity to the anomalous couplings is significantly improved down to about $7\cdot 10^{-12}~\mathrm{GeV}^{-4}$ if the proton time-of-flight is known with a precision of 20 ps in future measurements. The 95% CL sensitivity to broad neutral resonances reaches masses of order $ 1500~\mathrm{GeV} $ when using timing information., Comment: 23 pages, 10 figures

The goal of this whitepaper is to give a comprehensive overview of the rich field of forward physics. We discuss the occurrences of BFKL resummation effects in special final states, such as Mueller-Navelet jets, jet gap jets, and heavy quarkonium production. It further addresses TMD factorization at low x and the manifestation of a semi-hard saturation scale in (generalized) TMD PDFs. More theoretical aspects of low x physics, probes of the quark gluon plasma, as well as the possibility to use photon-hadron collisions at the LHC to constrain hadronic structure at low x, and the resulting complementarity between LHC and the EIC are also presented. We also briefly discuss diffraction at colliders as well as the possibility to explore further the electroweak theory in central exclusive events using the LHC as a photon-photon collider., Comment: 77 pages, 27 figures, contribution to Snowmass 2021; contributions updated and authors added

One of the main scenarios to account for the multi-wavelength flux variability observed in relativistic jets of AGNs is based on diffusive shock acceleration of a population of relativistic electrons on internal shocks of various origins. Any complete AGN emission scenario has to be able to explain the wide range of observed variability time scales between the radio and gamma-ray band. In addition constraints are also provided by very-long-baseline interferometry (VLBI), which shows a large variety of moving and standing emission zones with distinct behaviors. We aim to characterize the evolution of stationary and moving emission zones in the jet and to study their multi-wavelength signatures through emission maps and light curves. We focus our study on flare events that occur during strong interactions between moving ejecta and stationary recollimation shocks. We simulate relativistic jets with the magneto-hydrodynamic code MPI-AMRVAC and inject non-thermal particle distributions of electrons in shock regions. We follow the propagation of a moving shock and its interactions with a structure of standing re-collimation shocks in the jet. Synchrotron emission and radiative transfer are calculated in the post-processing code RIPTIDE for given observation angles and frequencies. We demonstrate the appearance of trailing components behind the leading moving shock. The latter destabilizes the jet, causing the emergence of oscillating standing shocks and relaxation shocks. Emissions from these regions can dominate the overall flux or lead to flare echos in the light curve. Another observational marker of relaxation shocks appears in time-distance plots of bright VLBI components of the jet. Our scenario provides a plausible explanation for radio VLBI observations of the radio-galaxy 3C 111 where trailing components have been observed during a radio outburst event in 1997., Comment: 13 pages, 12 figures

We study the quantum force between classical objects mediated by massive scalar fields bilinearly coupled to matter. The existence of such fields is motivated by dark matter, dark energy, and by the possibility of a hidden sector beyond the Standard Model. We introduce the quantum work felt by an arbitrary (either rigid or deformable) classical body in the presence of the scalar and show that it is finite upon requiring conservation of matter. As an example, we explicitly show that the quantum pressure inside a Dirichlet sphere is finite -- up to renormalizable divergences. Inside the bodies the scalar acquires an effective mass, leading to a behaviour for the quantum force which, in the case of rigid bodies, is reminiscent of the transition between the Casimir and Casimir-Polder forces. With this method we compute the scalar-induced quantum force in simple planar geometries. In plane-point geometry we show how to compute the contribution of the quantum force to the phase shift observable in atom interferometers. We show that atom interferometry is likely to become a competitive search method for light particles bilinearly coupled to matter, provided that the interferometer arms have lengths below ~10 cm., Comment: 41 pages, 5 figures. v4: Section 3 expanded, appendices added, and minor changes and additions to the text. Matches published version

Recurrent Novae are repeating thermonuclear explosions in the outer layers of white dwarfs, due to the accretion of fresh material from a binary companion. The shock generated by ejected material slamming into the companion star's wind, accelerates particles to very-high-energies. We report very-high-energy (VHE, $\gtrsim100$\,GeV) gamma rays from the recurrent nova RS\,Ophiuchi up to a month after its 2021 outburst, using the High Energy Stereoscopic System. The VHE emission has a similar temporal profile to lower-energy GeV emission, indicating a common origin, with a two-day delay in peak flux. These observations constrain models of time-dependent particle energization, favouring a hadronic emission scenario over the leptonic alternative. This confirms that shocks in dense winds provide favourable environments for efficient cosmic-ray acceleration to very-high-energies., Comment: Submitted 1st Nov. 2021, first release 10th March 2022 (accepted version)

Observations with imaging atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes (IACTs) have enhanced our knowledge of nearby supernova (SN) remnants with ages younger than 500 years by establishing Cassiopeia A and the remnant of Tycho's SN as very-high-energy (VHE) gamma-ray sources. The remnant of Kepler's SN, which is the product of the most recent naked-eye supernova in our Galaxy, is comparable in age to the other two, but is significantly more distant. If the gamma-ray luminosities of the remnants of Tycho's and Kepler's SNe are similar, then the latter is expected to be one of the faintest gamma-ray sources within reach of the current generation IACT arrays. Here we report evidence at a statistical level of 4.6 sigma for a VHE signal from the remnant of Kepler's SN based on deep observations by the High Energy Stereoscopic System (H.E.S.S.) with an exposure of 152 hours. The measured integral flux above an energy of 226 GeV is ~0.3% of the flux of the Crab Nebula. The spectral energy distribution (SED) reveals a gamma-ray emitting component connecting the VHE emission observed with H.E.S.S. to the emission observed at GeV energies with Fermi-LAT. The overall SED is similar to that of the remnant of Tycho's SN, possibly indicating the same non-thermal emission processes acting in both these young remnants of thermonuclear SNe., Comment: Published in Astronomy and Astrophysics. A typo in the normalization constant in Sect. 4 was corrected

We report on a search for persistent radio emission from the one-off Fast Radio Burst (FRB) 20190714A, as well as from two repeating FRBs, 20190711A and 20171019A, using the MeerKAT radio telescope. For FRB 20171019A we also conducted simultaneous observations with the High Energy Stereoscopic System (H.E.S.S.) in very high energy gamma rays and searched for signals in the ultraviolet, optical, and X-ray bands. For this FRB, we obtain a UV flux upper limit of 1.39x10^-16 erg/cm^-2/s/Amstrong, X-ray limit of ~ 6.6x10^-14 erg/cm^-2/s and a limit on the very-high-energy gamma-ray flux (Phi) (E > 120 GeV) < 1.7 x 10^-12 erg/cm^-2/s. We obtain a radio upper limit of ~15 microJy/beam for persistent emission at the locations of both FRBs 20190711A and 20171019A, but detect diffuse radio emission with a peak brightness of ~53 microJy/beam associated with FRB 20190714A at z = 0.2365. This represents the first detection of the radio continuum emission potentially associated with the host (galaxy) of FRB 20190714A, and is only the third known FRB to have such an association. Given the possible association of a faint persistent source, FRB 20190714A may potentially be a repeating FRB whose age lies between that of FRB 20121102A and FRB 20180916A. A parallel search for repeat bursts from these FRBs revealed no new detections down to a fluence of 0.08 Jy ms for a 1 ms duration burst., Comment: 15 pages, 9 figures

We report on the observations of four well-localized binary black hole (BBH) mergers by the High Energy Stereoscopic System (H.E.S.S.) during the second and third observing runs of Advanced LIGO and Advanced Virgo, O2 and O3. H.E.S.S. can observe $\mathrm{20\,deg^2}$ of the sky at a time and follows up gravitational-wave (GW) events by ``tiling'' localization regions to maximize the covered localization probability. During O2 and O3, H.E.S.S. observed large portions of the localization regions, between 35\% and 75\%, for four BBH mergers (GW170814, GW190512\_180714, GW190728\_064510, and S200224ca). For these four GW events, we find no significant signal from a pointlike source in any of the observations, and set upper limits on the very high energy ($>$100 GeV) $\gamma$-ray emission. The 1-10 TeV isotropic luminosity of these GW events is below $10^{45}$ erg s$^{-1}$ at the times of the H.E.S.S. observations, around the level of the low-luminosity GRB 190829A. Assuming no changes are made to how follow-up observations are conducted, H.E.S.S. can expect to observe over 60 GW events per year in the fourth GW observing run, O4, of which eight would be observable with minimal latency.

We study quantum fields on an arbitrary, rigid background with boundary. We derive the action for a scalar in the holographic basis that separates the boundary and bulk degrees of freedom. A relation between Dirichlet and Neumann propagators valid for any background is obtained from this holographic action. As a simple application, we derive an exact formula for the flux of bulk modes emitted from the boundary in a warped background. We also derive a formula for the Casimir pressure on a $(d-1)$-brane depending only on the boundary-to-bulk propagators, and apply it in AdS. Turning on couplings and using the holographic basis, we evaluate the one-loop boundary effective action in AdS by means of the heat kernel expansion. We extract anomalous dimensions of single and double trace CFT operators generated by loops of heavy scalars and nonabelian vectors, up to third order in the large squared mass expansion. From the boundary heat kernel coefficients we identify CFT operator mixing and corrections to OPE data, in addition to the radiative generation of local operators. We integrate out nonabelian vector fluctuations in AdS$_{4,5,6}$ and obtain the associated holographic Yang-Mills $\beta$ functions. Turning to the expanding patch of dS, following recent proposals, we provide a boundary effective action generating the perturbative cosmological correlators using analytical continuation from dS to EAdS. We obtain the "cosmological" heat kernel coefficients in the scalar case and work out the divergent part of the dS$_4$ effective action which renormalizes the cosmological correlators. We find that bulk masses and wavefunction can logarithmically run as a result of the dS$_4$ curvature, and that operators on the late time boundary are radiatively generated. More developments are needed to extract all one-loop information from the cosmological effective action., Comment: 66+14 pages, 8 figures. v2: Results added in AdS and dS sections. Minor corrections, improved text, figures and references added

Magnetar hyperflares are the most plausible explanation for fast radio bursts (FRB) -- enigmatic powerful radio pulses with durations of several milliseconds and high brightness temperatures. The first observational evidence for this scenario was obtained in 2020 April when a FRB was detected from the direction of the Galactic magnetar and soft gamma-ray repeater SGR\,1935+2154. The FRB was preceded by two gamma-ray outburst alerts by the BAT instrument aboard the Swift satellite, which triggered follow-up observations by the High Energy Stereoscopic System (H.E.S.S.). H.E.S.S. has observed SGR\,1935+2154 for 2 hr on 2020 April 28. The observations are coincident with X-ray bursts from the magnetar detected by INTEGRAL and Fermi-GBM, thus providing the first very high energy (VHE) gamma-ray observations of a magnetar in a flaring state. High-quality data acquired during these follow-up observations allow us to perform a search for short-time transients. No significant signal at energies $E>0.6$~TeV is found and upper limits on the persistent and transient emission are derived. We here present the analysis of these observations and discuss the obtained results and prospects of the H.E.S.S. follow-up program for soft gamma-ray repeaters., Comment: Received 2021 June 13; accepted 2021 June 28; published 2021 September 29

The results of gamma-ray observations of the binary system HESS J0632+057 collected during 450 hours over 15 years, between 2004 and 2019, are presented. Data taken with the atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes H.E.S.S., MAGIC, and VERITAS at energies above 350 GeV were used together with observations at X-ray energies obtained with Swift-XRT, Chandra, XMM-Newton, NuSTAR, and Suzaku. Some of these observations were accompanied by measurements of the H{\alpha} emission line. A significant detection of the modulation of the VHE gamma-ray fluxes with a period of 316.7+-4.4 days is reported, consistent with the period of 317.3+-0.7 days obtained with a refined analysis of X-ray data. The analysis of data of four orbital cycles with dense observational coverage reveals short timescale variability, with flux-decay timescales of less than 20 days at very high energies. Flux variations observed over the time scale of several years indicate orbit-to-orbit variability. The analysis confirms the previously reported correlation of X-ray and gamma-ray emission from the system at very high significance, but can not find any correlation of optical H{\alpha} parameters with X-ray or gamma-ray energy fluxes in simultaneous observations. The key finding is that the emission of HESS J0632+057 in the X-ray and gamma-ray energy bands is highly variable on different time scales. The ratio of gamma-ray to X-ray flux shows the equality or even dominance of the gamma-ray energy range. This wealth of new data is interpreted taking into account the insufficient knowledge of the ephemeris of the system, and discussed in the context of results reported on other gamma-ray binary systems., Comment: Accepted for publication by The Astrophysical Journal

We analyzed 252 hours of High Energy Stereoscopic System (H.E.S.S.) observations towards the supernova remnant (SNR) LMC N132D that were accumulated between December 2004 and March 2016 during a deep survey of the Large Magellanic Cloud, adding 104 hours of observations to the previously published data set to ensure a > 5 sigma detection. To broaden the gamma-ray spectral coverage required for modeling the spectral energy distribution, an analysis of Fermi-LAT Pass 8 data was also included. We unambiguously detect N132D at very high energies (VHE) with a significance of 5.7 sigma. We report the results of a detailed analysis of its spectrum and localization based on the extended H.E.S.S. data set. The joint analysis of the extended H.E.S.S and Fermi-LAT data results in a spectral energy distribution in the energy range from 1.7 GeV to 14.8 TeV, which suggests a high luminosity of N132D at GeV and TeV energies. We set a lower limit on a gamma-ray cutoff energy of 8 TeV with a confidence level of 95%. The new gamma-ray spectrum as well as multiwavelength observations of N132D when compared to physical models suggests a hadronic origin of the VHE gamma-ray emission. SNR N132D is a VHE gamma-ray source that shows a spectrum extending to the VHE domain without a spectral cutoff at a few TeV, unlike the younger oxygen-rich SNR Cassiopeia A. The gamma-ray properties of N132D may be affected by an interaction with a nearby molecular cloud that partially lies inside the 95% confidence region of the source position. [Abridged], Comment: Accepted for publication in Astronomy & Astrophysics