Neutrino flux predictions for known Galactic microquasars

C Distefano, D Guetta, E Waxman, A Levinson

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

110 Scopus citations

Abstract

It has been proposed recently that Galactic microquasars may be prodigious emitters of TeV neutrinos that can be detected by upcoming km2 neutrino telescopes. In this paper we consider a sample of identified microquasars and microquasar candidates for which available data enable rough determination of the jet parameters. By employing the parameters inferred from radio observations of various jet ejection events, we determine the neutrino fluxes that should have been produced during these events by photopion production in the jet. Despite the large uncertainties in our analysis, we demonstrate that in several of the sources considered the neutrino flux at Earth, produced in events similar to those observed, would exceed the detection threshold of a km2 neutrino detector. The class of microquasars may contain also sources with bulk Lorentz factors larger than those characteristic of the sample considered here, directed along our line of sight. Such sources, which may be very difficult to resolve at radio wavelengths and hence may be difficult to identify as microquasar candidates, may emit neutrinos with fluxes significantly larger than those typically obtained in the present analysis. These sources may eventually be identified through their neutrino and gamma-ray emission.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)378-383
Number of pages6
JournalAstrophysical Journal
Volume575
Issue number1
DOIs
StatePublished - 10 Aug 2002
Externally publishedYes

Keywords

  • acceleration of particles
  • neutrinos
  • X-rays : binaries

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