Detection of very high-energy gamma-ray emission from the radio galaxy M87 with LHAASO

TL;DR

This paper reports the detection of very-high-energy gamma-ray emission from M87 using LHAASO, including a significant flare, spectral analysis, and implications for the emission region size and extragalactic background light constraints.

Contribution

First long-term VHE gamma-ray monitoring of M87 with LHAASO, revealing a significant detection, spectral features, and a detailed flare analysis with implications for emission region size.

Findings

M87 detected at ~9σ significance by LHAASO.

A strong 8-day VHE flare observed in early 2022.

Spectral extension up to 20 TeV with possible hardening and softening.

Abstract

The nearby radio galaxy M87 is a very-high-energy (VHE) gamma-ray emitter established by observations with ground-based gamma-ray detectors. Here we report the long-term monitoring of M87 from 2021 to 2024 with Large High Altitude Air Shower Observatory (LHAASO). M87 has been detected by LHAASO with a statistical significance $\sim 9\sigma$. The observed energy spectrum extends to 20 TeV, with a possible hardening at $\sim 20$ TeV and then a clear softening at higher energies. Assuming that the intrinsic spectrum is described by a single power law up to 20 TeV, a tight upper bound on the extragalactic background light (EBL) intensity is obtained. A strong VHE flare lasting eight days, with the rise time of $\tau_{r}^{\rm rise} = 1.05\pm0.49$~days and decay time of $\tau_{d}^{\rm decay} = 2.17\pm0.58$~days, was found in early 2022. A possible GeV flare is seen also in the Fermi-LAT data during the VHE flare period. The variability time as short as one day seen in the LHAASO data suggests a compact emission region with a size of $\sim 3\times 10^{15}\delta\, {\rm cm}$ ($\delta$ being the Doppler factor of the emitting region), corresponding to a few Schwarzschild radii of the central supermassive black hole in M87. The continuous monitoring of the source reveals a duty cycle of $\sim 1\%$ for VHE flares with a flux above $ 10^{-11}{\rm~erg~cm^{-2}~s^{-1}}$.