Following up Transient Sources at Very High Energies with MAGIC

TL;DR

This paper discusses MAGIC's alert system for detecting transient high-energy sources, emphasizing its role in multi-messenger astronomy and its recent updates to include neutrino and gravitational wave alerts.

Contribution

It introduces the upgraded MAGIC alert system designed for efficient follow-up of transient sources in a multi-messenger context.

Findings

MAGIC's alert system enables rapid follow-up of transient events.

The system has been expanded to include neutrino and GW alerts.

MAGIC's transient program adapts to multi-wavelength and multi-messenger observations.

Abstract

Several classes of sources are known to emit different messengers. Among them, transient sources are a special case, due to their serendipitous occurrence, time variability and duration on different timescales. They are associated with explosive and catastrophic events where very compact objects like neutron stars and black holes are involved. The difficulty of observing such elusive and possibly short-lasting events requires a fast reaction and a well-organized alert network between different experiments. In order to characterize them in the best possible way, instruments with a wide field of view should serve as external triggers for facilities with small sky coverage. MAGIC, as a Cherenkov telescope, belongs to the latter category. The search for transients by MAGIC is possible thanks to an automatic alert system listening to the alerts sent by the Gamma-ray Coordinate Network (GCN). In this contribution we describe the MAGIC alert system, which was designed mainly for the follow-up of Gamma-Ray Bursts in its initial conception. The alert system was recently updated in a multi-messenger context, receiving alerts also from neutrino and GW observatories. Finally we will present the MAGIC program for transient sources and how it was adapted in the current multi-wavelength and multi-messenger panorama.