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COMPTEL observations of the Orion complex: Evidence for cosmic-ray induced lines

COMPTEL observations of the Orion complex: Evidence for cosmic-ray induced lines

Authors :
C. P. de Vries
H. Bloemen
K. Bennett
Derek W. Morris
R. Wijnands
V. Schönfelder
B. N. Swanenburg
James M. Ryan
G. G. Lichti
W. Hermsen
Andrew W. Strong
C. Winkler
Roland Diehl
Source :
AIP Conference Proceedings.
Publication Year :
1994
Publisher :
AIP, 1994.

Abstract

COMPTEL has detected γ‐ray emission from the Orion complex in the 3–7 MeV range, which can be identified with the 4.44 MeV and 6.13 MeV nuclear de‐excitation lines of 12C* and 16O*, respectively. These are predicted to be the strongest γ‐ray lines originating from the interaction of energetic particles with ambient matter, but the observed flux of (1.0±0.15)×10−4 photon cm−2 s−1 (3–7 MeV) is much larger than anticipated. There is circumstantial evidence that this should be attributed to strongly enhanced abundances of C and O in low‐energy cosmic rays (∼10 MeV/nucleon), rather than high fluxes of cosmic‐ray protons and α‐particles. The positrons resulting from energetic particle interactions in the Orion region should produce 511 keV annihilation radiation that is detectable by OSSE.

Details

ISSN :
0094243X
Database :
OpenAIRE
Journal :
AIP Conference Proceedings
Accession number :
edsair.doi...........7c8212ab1568da77b08cdd67f990af14
Full Text :
https://doi.org/10.1063/1.45683