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Polarized blazar X-rays imply particle acceleration in shocks

2022; Nature Portfolio; Volume: 611; Issue: 7937 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1038/s41586-022-05338-0

1476-4687

Ioannis Liodakis, Alan P. Marscher, I. Agudo, A. Berdyugin, M. Bernardos, G. Bonnoli, Г. А. Борман, C. Casadio, V. Casanova, E. Cavazzuti, Nicole Rodriguez Cavero, Laura Di Gesu, Niccolò Di Lalla, I. Donnarumma, Steven R. Ehlert, M. Errando, Juan Escudero, Maya García‐Comas, Beatriz Agı́s-González, C. Husillos, Jenni Jormanainen, Svetlana G. Jorstad, Masato Kagitani, E. N. Kopatskaya, Vadim Kravtsov, H. Krawczynski, E. Lindfors, Е. Г. Ларионова, G. Madejski, Frédéric Marin, Alessandro Marchini, Herman L. Marshall, D. A. Morozova, F. Massaro, J. Masiero, Dimitri Mawet, R. Middei, Maxwell A. Millar‐Blanchaer, I. Myserlis, Michela Negro, K. Nilsson, Stephen L. O’Dell, N. Omodei, L. Pacciani, A. Paggi, G. V. Panopoulou, Abel L. Peirson, M. Perri, Pierre-Olivier Petrucci, Juri Poutanen, Simonetta Puccetti, Roger W. Romani, Takeshi Sakanoi, С. С. Савченко, A. Sota, F. Tavecchio, Samaporn Tinyanont, A. A. Vasilyev, Z. R. Weaver, А. В. Жовтан, L. A. Antonelli, Matteo Bachetti, L. Baldini, W. H. Baumgartner, R. Bellazzini, S. Bianchi, Stephen D. Bongiorno, R. Bonino, A. Brez, N. Bucciantini, Fiamma Capitanio, Simone Castellano, S. Ciprini, E. Costa, Alessandra De Rosa, E. Del Monte, Alessandro Di Marco, Victor Doroshenko, Michal Dovčiak, Teruaki Enoto, Y. Evangelista, Sergio Fabiani, Riccardo Ferrazzoli, Javier A. García, Shuichi Gunji, Kiyoshi Hayashida, Jeremy Heyl, W. Iwakiri, V. Karas, Takao Kitaguchi, Jeffery J. Kolodziejczak, Fabio La Monaca, L. Latronico, S. Maldera, Alberto Manfreda, Andrea Marinucci, G. Matt, Ikuyuki Mitsuishi, Tsunefumi Mizuno, Fabio Muleri, Stephen C.-Y. Ng, C. Oppedisano, Alessandro Papitto, George G. Pavlov, M. Pesce-Rollins, M. Pilia, Andrea Possenti, Brian D. Ramsey, John Rankin, Ajay Ratheesh, C. Sgrò, Patrick Slane, P. Soffitta, G. Spandre, Toru Tamagawa, Roberto Taverna, Yuzuru Tawara, Allyn F. Tennant, Nicolas E. Thomas, Francesco Tombesi, A. Trois, Sergey S. Tsygankov, R. Turolla, Jacco Vink, Martin C. Weisskopf, Kinwah Wu, Fei Xie, Silvia Zane,

Neutrino Physics Research

Abstract Most of the light from blazars, active galactic nuclei with jets of magnetized plasma that point nearly along the line of sight, is produced by high-energy particles, up to around 1 TeV. Although the jets are known to be ultimately powered by a supermassive black hole, how the particles are accelerated to such high energies has been an unanswered question. The process must be related to the magnetic field, which can be probed by observations of the polarization of light from the jets. Measurements of the radio to optical polarization—the only range available until now—probe extended regions of the jet containing particles that left the acceleration site days to years earlier 1–3 , and hence do not directly explore the acceleration mechanism, as could X-ray measurements. Here we report the detection of X-ray polarization from the blazar Markarian 501 (Mrk 501). We measure an X-ray linear polarization degree Π X of around 10%, which is a factor of around 2 higher than the value at optical wavelengths, with a polarization angle parallel to the radio jet. This points to a shock front as the source of particle acceleration and also implies that the plasma becomes increasingly turbulent with distance from the shock.