8th HEAD Meeting, 8-11 September, 2004
Session 20 Black Hole Binaries and Intermediate Mass Black Holes
Oral, Thursday, September 9, 2004, 2:00-3:38pm

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[20.02] Discovery of TeV Gamma-Ray Emission from the Galactic Center

J.H. Buckley (Washington University in St. Louis), VERITAS Collaboration

We report on the detection of TeV gamma rays from the Galactic center region by the Whipple 10m gamma-ray telescope. Thirty hours of data were taken over an extended period from 1995 to 2004 resulting in an excess corresponding to an integral flux of 1.6 x 10-8 ± 0.5m-2 sec-1 at a median energy of 2.8 TeV, roughly 40% of the flux from the Crab Nebula at that same energy. The 15 arcmin diameter 95% confidence region includes the position of Sgr A*. We present the results of the data analysis reported previously (Kosack et al., ApJ, 608, L97) as well as the results of a new analysis on additional data taken in 2004. We discuss the implications of these observations on astrophysical sources such as Sgr A*, and on the theoretical annihilation flux from a dark matter cusp in the galactic center. This work is supported by the US DOE, NSF, the Smithsonian Institution, PPARC (UK), NSERC (Canada) and Enterprise-Ireland.


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

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Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 36 #3
© 2004. The American Astronomical Soceity.