Department Physics and Astronomy, University of Leicester, University Road, Leicester LE1 7RH, UK.
Philos Trans A Math Phys Eng Sci. 2013 Apr 29;371(1992):20120279. doi: 10.1098/rsta.2012.0279. Print 2013 Jun 13.
Cosmic explosions dissipate energy into their surroundings on a very wide range of time scales: producing shock waves and associated particle acceleration. The historical culprits for the acceleration of the bulk of Galactic cosmic rays are supernova remnants: explosions on approximately 10(4) year time scales. Increasingly, however, time-variable emission points to rapid and efficient particle acceleration in a range of different astrophysical systems. Gamma-ray bursts have the shortest time scales, with inferred bulk Lorentz factors of approximately 1000 and photons emitted beyond 100 GeV, but active galaxies, pulsar wind nebulae and colliding stellar winds are all now associated with time-variable emission at approximately teraelectron volt energies. Cosmic photons and neutrinos at these energies offer a powerful probe of the underlying physical mechanisms of cosmic explosions, and a tool for exploring fundamental physics with these systems. Here, we discuss the motivations for high-energy observations of transients, the current experimental situation, and the prospects for the next decade, with particular reference to the major next-generation high-energy observatory, the Cherenkov Telescope Array.
产生冲击波和相关的粒子加速。在历史上，银河宇宙射线的大部分加速的罪魁祸首是超新星遗迹：大约在 10^4 年的时间尺度上发生爆炸。然而，越来越多的时变发射指向在一系列不同的天体物理系统中快速有效地加速粒子。伽马射线暴具有最短的时间尺度，推断的整体洛伦兹因子约为 1000，发射的光子超过 100GeV，但活动星系、脉冲星风星云和碰撞恒星风现在都与大约 10^4eV 能量的时变发射有关。这些能量的宇宙光子和中微子为宇宙爆炸的潜在物理机制提供了强大的探测工具，并为利用这些系统探索基本物理提供了一种工具。在这里，我们讨论了对瞬态现象进行高能观测的动机、当前的实验情况以及未来十年的前景，特别提到了主要的下一代高能观测站——切伦科夫望远镜阵列。
