AGN Neutrino flux estimates for a realistic hybrid model

TL;DR

This paper presents a comprehensive hybrid model to accurately estimate neutrino fluxes from AGN, considering full spectral energy density and reaction chains, improving upon crude previous estimates and aiding IceCube detection predictions.

Contribution

It introduces a detailed, time-dependent hybrid model for neutrino flux estimation from AGN, incorporating full spectral and reaction processes, and compares its accuracy to simpler methods.

Findings

Identifies parameter regions where simple estimates are valid.

Provides more accurate neutrino flux predictions for AGN.

Enables straightforward IceCube detection rate calculations.

Abstract

Recent reports of possible correlations between high energy neutrinos observed by IceCube and Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) activity sparked a burst of publications that attempt to predict the neutrino flux of these sources. However, often rather crude estimates are used to derive the neutrino rate from the observed photon spectra. In this work neutrino fluxes were computed in a wide parameter space. The starting point of the model was a representation of the full spectral energy density (SED) of \textit{3C 279}. The time-dependent hybrid model that was used for this study takes into account the full $p\gamma$ reaction chain as well as proton synchrotron, electron-positron-pair cascades and the full SSC scheme. We compare our results to estimates frequently used in the literature. This allows to identify regions in the parameter space for which such estimates are still valid and those in which they can produce significant errors. Furthermore, if estimates for the Doppler factor, magnetic field, proton and electron densities of a source exist, the expected IceCube detection rate is readily available.