The redshift-dependence of gamma-ray absorption in the environments of strong-line AGN

Abstract

The case of gamma-ray absorption due to photon-photon pair production of jet photons in the external photon environment like accretion disk and broad-line region radiation field of gamma-ray loud active galactic nuclei (AGN) that exhibit strong emission lines is considered. I demonstrate that this ''local opacity'', if detected, will almost unavoidably be redshift-dependent in the sub-TeV range. This introduces non-negligible biases, and complicates approaches for studying the evolution of the extragalactic background light with contemporary GeV instruments like e.g. the Gamma-ray Large Area Space Telescope (GLAST), etc., where the gamma-ray horizon is probed by means of statistical analysis of absorption features (e.g. Fazio-Stecker relation, etc.) in AGN spectra at various redshifts. It particularly applies to strong-line quasars where external photon fields are potentially involved in gamma-ray production.

arXiv comment19 pages, 5 figures; accepted for publication in ApJ

References in corpus (30)

• Unified Schemes for Radio-Loud Active Galactic Nuclei
• Local Supermassive Black Holes, Relics of Active Galactic Nuclei and the X-ray Background
• Cosmological Evolution of the Hard X-ray AGN Luminosity Function and the Origin of the Hard X-ray Background
• A Physical Model for the Co-evolution of QSOs and of their Spheroidal Hosts
• Luminosity-dependent evolution of soft X-ray selected AGN: New Chandra and XMM-Newton surveys
• BL Lac Objects in the Synchrotron Proton Blazar Model
• TeV Gamma Rays from BL Lac Objects due to Synchrotron Radiation of Extremely High Energy Protons
• The Cosmic Evolution of Hard X-ray Selected Active Galactic Nuclei
• Intergalactic Photon Spectra from the Far IR to the UV Lyman Limit for $0<z<6$ and the Optical Depth of the Universe to High Energy Gamma-Rays
• Implications of Cosmological Gamma-Ray Absorption II. Modification of gamma-ray spectra
• Jets and accretion processes in Active Galactic Nuclei: further clues
• Neutral Beams from Blazar Jets
• The evolution of faint AGN between z~1 and z~5 from the COMBO-17 survey
• Quasar Luminosity Functions from Joint Evolution of Black Holes and Host Galaxies
• The anti-hierarchical growth of supermassive black holes
• Cosmic Evolution of Mass Accretion Rate and Metalicity in Active Galactic Nuclei
• Supermassive Black Hole Accretion History Inferred from a Large Sample of Chandra Hard X-ray Sources
• The Deep X-Ray Radio Blazar Survey (DXRBS). III. Radio Number Counts, Evolutionary Properties, and Luminosity Function of Blazars
• Radiation fields of disk, BLR and torus in quasars and blazars: implications for gamma-ray absorption
• Probing Galaxy Formation with TeV Gamma Ray Absorption
• Modeling Variable Emission Lines in AGNs: Method and Application to NGC 5548
• Statistics of Cosmological Black Hole Jet Sources: Blazar Predictions for GLAST
• External Compton Radiation from Rapid Nonthermal Flares in Blazars
• The effect of stellar feedback and quasar winds on the AGN population
• The Space Density of High-Redshift QSOs in the GOODS Survey
• Corrected Table for the Parametric Coefficients for the Optical Depth of the Universe to Gamma-rays at Various Redshifts
• Optical spectroscopy of BL Lacertae objects. Broad lines, companion galaxies and redshift lower limits
• Implications of Gamma-Ray Transparency Constraints in Blazars: Minimum Distances and Gamma-Ray Collimation
• Photon-photon absorption above a molecular cloud torus in blazars
• Detecting the Attenuation of Blazar Gamma-ray Emission by Extragalactic Background Light with GLAST

Cited by in corpus (55)

• The Large Area Telescope on the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope Mission
• Fermi Large Area Telescope First Source Catalog
• MAGIC discovery of VHE Emission from the FSRQ PKS 1222+21
• Synchrotron Self-Compton Analysis of TeV X-ray Selected BL Lacertae Objects
• The Imprint of The Extragalactic Background Light in the Gamma-Ray Spectra of Blazars
• GeV breaks in blazars as a result of gamma-ray absorption within the broad-line region
• Gamma-Ray Studies of Blazars: Synchro-Compton Analysis of Flat Spectrum Radio Quasars
• Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope Observations of the Gamma-ray Outburst from 3C 454.3 in November 2010
• The extragalactic background light, the Hubble constant, and anomalies: conclusions from 20 years of TeV gamma-ray observations
• Measurement of the extragalactic background light imprint on the spectra of the brightest blazars observed with H.E.S.S
• Early Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope Observations of the Quasar 3C 454.3
• Similarity of the Optical-IR and Gamma-Ray Time Variability of Fermi Blazars
• The spectrum of the Broad Line Region and the high-energy emission of powerful blazars
• Fermi Large Area Telescope Constraints on the Gamma-ray Opacity of the Universe
• Constraining the Location of Gamma-Ray Flares in Luminous Blazars
• On the Spectral Break in the Fermi-LAT Spectrum of 3C 454.3
• Fermi Large Area Telescope Detection of Bright Gamma-ray Outbursts from a Peculiar Quasar 4C +21.35
• The Extragalactic Gamma-ray Sky in the Fermi era
• The stellar contribution to the extra-galactic background light and absorption of high-energy gamma-rays
• Gamma-Gamma Absorption in the Broad Line Region Radiation Fields of Gamma-Ray Blazars
• Intrinsic absorption in 3C 279 at GeV-TeV energies and consequences for estimates of the EBL
• Gamma-rays from Blazars and the Extragalactic Background Light
• Modification of the gamma-ray spectra by internal absorption in OVV blazars: The example cases of 3C 273 and 3C 279
• Absorption of 10 Gev--1 Tev Gamma Rays by Radiation from Broad-Line Region in 3C 279
• Gamma-ray opacity of the anisotropic stratified broad-line regions in blazars
• First stars and the extragalactic background light: How recent gamma-ray observations constrain the early universe
• VHE Gamma-Ray Induced Pair Cascades in the Radiation Fields of Dust Tori of AGN: Application to Cen A
• Probing the very-high-energy gamma-ray spectral curvature in the blazar PG 1553+113 with the MAGIC telescopes
• Modeling the hard TeV spectra of blazars 1ES 0229+200 and 3C 66A with an internal absorption scenario
• Multiwavelength Photometric and Spectropolarimetric Analysis of the FSRQ 3C 279
• H.E.S.S. detection of very-high-energy gamma-ray emission from the quasar PKS 0736+017
• The vanishing of the primary emission region in PKS 1510-089
• Absorption of 10 Gev--1 Tev Gamma Rays from 3C 279
• The Optical Variability of the Quasar 3C~279: The Signature of a Decelerating Jet?
• Studies of active galactic nuclei with CTA
• MAGIC upper limits to the VHE gamma-ray flux of 3C454.3 in high emission state
• Investigation of the Gamma-ray Spectrum of CTA 102 During the Exceptional Flaring State in 2016-2017
• Cosmic Analogues of the Stern-Gerlach Experiment and the Detection of Light Bosons
• How gravitational lensing helps gamma-ray photons avoid $\gamma -\gamma$ absorption
• Prospects for gamma-ray observations of narrow-line Seyfert 1 galaxies with the Cherenkov Telescope Array II. Gamma-gamma absorption in the broad-line region radiation fields
• VHE Gamma-Ray Induced Pair Cascades in Blazars and Radio Galaxies: Application to NGC 1275
• Potential of the next generation VHE instruments to probe the EBL (I): the low- and mid-VHE
• Shaping the GeV-spectra of bright blazars
• A stratified jet model for AGN emission in the two-flow paradigm
• Synchrotron Emission from VHE Gamma-Ray Induced Pair Cascades in AGN Environments
• Pair Cascades at the Edge of the Broad-Line Region Shaping the Gamma-Ray Spectrum of 3C 279
• Multi-wavelength emission from 3C 66A: clues on its redshift and gamma-ray emission location
• Blazars and Optical Depth in a non-linear, time-dependent injection and cooling scenario
• Ultra High Energy Neutrino Event KM3-230213A as a Signal of Electroweak Vacuum Turbulence in Merging Black Hole Binaries
• Constraints on the Optical-IR extragalactic background from gamma-ray absorption studies
• Blazar jet physics in the age of Fermi
• Searching for an EBL attenuation signature in the Fermi/LAT 1st year catalog data
• Hints of correlation between broad-line and radio variations for 3C 120
• Modeling Fermi Large Area Telescope and Multiwavelength Data from Blazars
• JD6 - The Connection between Radio Properties and High Energy Emission in AGNs