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[26.03] A Kinship between Sgr A East and the EGRET SNR's

M. Fatuzzo (Xavier University), F. Melia (University of Arizona)

Sgr A East appears to be a single, mixed-morphology 10,000-year-old supernova remnant (SNR) at the Galactic center. It also appears to belong to a class of remnants that have been observed and detected at 1720 MHz, the transition frequency of OH maser emission. However, if the EGRET source 3EG J1746-2852 coincident with the Galactic center is itself associated with this object, it would endow it with a \gamma-ray luminosity almost two orders of magnitude greater than that of the other EGRET-detected SNR's. We here reconsider the viability of a pion-production mechanism as the source of the broadband emission observed from Sgr A East, and show that what connects these objects---and ultimately also accounts for their different \gamma-ray emissivity---is the very important interaction between the expanding SNR shell and the surrounding molecular cloud environment. The singularly high \gamma-ray luminosity of Sgr A East, as well as its unusually steep radio spectral index, can thereby be attributed to the high-density (n_H=10³ cm^-3), strong magnetized (B~0.18 mG) environment in which it is located.

The author(s) of this abstract have provided an email address for comments about the abstract: fatuzzo@xu.edu

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Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 35 #3
© 2003. The American Astronomical Soceity.