Upper Limits on Gamma-ray Emission from Supernovae Serendipitously Observed with H.E.S.S.

by Rachel Simoni

Monday 15 May 2017, 11:00 → 12:00 Europe/Brussels

Universe

I’ll report on a project I’m involved in, about 9 type II nearby supernovae (SNe) which were serendipitously within the field of view of H.E.S.S. telescopes, and this within a year after the outburst. For no-one of these objects we observe a significant detection and can set some upper limits on their very high energy gamma -ray emission. The general context is PeV cosmic ray (CR) acceleration : Supernovae remnants (SNRs) have been proven to be able to accelerate CR particles up to ∼ 10^14 eV, there is however no observational evidence so far that they can accelerate particles up to 1 PeV. Some recent theoretical studies of supernovae indicate that particles with PeV energies and beyond shall be produced as the SN shock propagates in a very dense environment. Very-high-energy gamma-rays will be generated by-product and the current generation of Air Shower Cherenkov Telescopes like H.E.S.S. should be able to detect them.