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. 2011 Feb 11;331(6018):739-42.
doi: 10.1126/science.1199705. Epub 2011 Jan 6.

Gamma-ray flares from the Crab Nebula

A A Abdo  1 , M Ackermann, M Ajello, A Allafort, L Baldini, J Ballet, G Barbiellini, D Bastieri, K Bechtol, R Bellazzini, B Berenji, R D Blandford, E D Bloom, E Bonamente, A W Borgland, A Bouvier, T J Brandt, J Bregeon, A Brez, M Brigida, P Bruel, R Buehler, S Buson, G A Caliandro, R A Cameron, A Cannon, P A Caraveo, J M Casandjian, Ö Çelik, E Charles, A Chekhtman, C C Cheung, J Chiang, S Ciprini, R Claus, J Cohen-Tanugi, L Costamante, S Cutini, F D'Ammando, C D Dermer, A de Angelis, A de Luca, F de Palma, S W Digel, E do Couto e Silva, P S Drell, A Drlica-Wagner, R Dubois, D Dumora, C Favuzzi, S J Fegan, E C Ferrara, W B Focke, P Fortin, M Frailis, Y Fukazawa, S Funk, P Fusco, F Gargano, D Gasparrini, N Gehrels, S Germani, N Giglietto, F Giordano, M Giroletti, T Glanzman, G Godfrey, I A Grenier, M-H Grondin, J E Grove, S Guiriec, D Hadasch, Y Hanabata, A K Harding, K Hayashi, M Hayashida, E Hays, D Horan, R Itoh, G Jóhannesson, A S Johnson, T J Johnson, D Khangulyan, T Kamae, H Katagiri, J Kataoka, M Kerr, J Knödlseder, M Kuss, J Lande, L Latronico, S-H Lee, M Lemoine-Goumard, F Longo, F Loparco, P Lubrano, G M Madejski, A Makeev, M Marelli, M N Mazziotta, J E McEnery, P F Michelson, W Mitthumsiri, T Mizuno, A A Moiseev, C Monte, M E Monzani, A Morselli, I V Moskalenko, S Murgia, T Nakamori, M Naumann-Godo, P L Nolan, J P Norris, E Nuss, T Ohsugi, A Okumura, N Omodei, J F Ormes, M Ozaki, D Paneque, D Parent, V Pelassa, M Pepe, M Pesce-Rollins, M Pierbattista, F Piron, T A Porter, S Rainò, R Rando, P S Ray, M Razzano, A Reimer, O Reimer, T Reposeur, S Ritz, R W Romani, H F-W Sadrozinski, D Sanchez, P M Saz Parkinson, J D Scargle, T L Schalk, C Sgrò, E J Siskind, P D Smith, G Spandre, P Spinelli, M S Strickman, D J Suson, H Takahashi, T Takahashi, T Tanaka, J B Thayer, D J Thompson, L Tibaldo, D F Torres, G Tosti, A Tramacere, E Troja, Y Uchiyama, J Vandenbroucke, V Vasileiou, G Vianello, V Vitale, P Wang, K S Wood, Z Yang, M Ziegler
Affiliations

Gamma-ray flares from the Crab Nebula

A A Abdo et al. Science. .

Abstract

A young and energetic pulsar powers the well-known Crab Nebula. Here, we describe two separate gamma-ray (photon energy greater than 100 mega-electron volts) flares from this source detected by the Large Area Telescope on board the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope. The first flare occurred in February 2009 and lasted approximately 16 days. The second flare was detected in September 2010 and lasted approximately 4 days. During these outbursts, the gamma-ray flux from the nebula increased by factors of four and six, respectively. The brevity of the flares implies that the gamma rays were emitted via synchrotron radiation from peta-electron-volt (10(15) electron volts) electrons in a region smaller than 1.4 × 10(-2) parsecs. These are the highest-energy particles that can be associated with a discrete astronomical source, and they pose challenges to particle acceleration theory.

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