Journal
ASTROPHYSICAL JOURNAL
Volume 754, Issue 2, Pages -Publisher
IOP PUBLISHING LTD
DOI: 10.1088/0004-637X/754/2/114
Keywords
galaxies: active; galaxies: jets; gamma rays: galaxies; quasars: individual (3C 279); radiation mechanisms: non-thermal; X-rays: galaxies
Categories
Funding
- Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica in Italy
- Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales in France
- Smithsonian Institution
- Academia Sinica
- Russian RFBR foundation [09-02-00092]
- MICIIN (Spain) [AYA2010-14844]
- CEIC (Andalucia) [P09-FQM-4784]
- Academy of Finland [212656, 210338, 121148]
- NASA Fermi GI [NNX08AV65G, NNX08AV61G, NNX09AT99G, NNX09AU10G]
- NSF [AST-0907893, AST-0607523]
- BU
- Lowell Observatory
- UK Science and Technology Facilities Council
- Georgian National Science Foundation [GNSF/ST09/521 4-320]
- NASA
- NASA [NNX09AU16G, NNX10AP16G, NNX11AO13G]
- University of Michigan
- Japan Society for the Promotion of Science for Young Scientists
- Polish MNiSW [N N203 301635, N N203 386337]
- Polish ASTRONET [621/E-78/SN-0068/2007]
- Polish NCN [DEC-2011/01/B/ST9/04845]
- STFC [ST/G009465/1, ST/J001600/1] Funding Source: UKRI
- NASA [90734, NNX09AU10G, 107215, NNX08AV65G, 94484, NNX09AT99G, 107306, NNX08AV61G] Funding Source: Federal RePORTER
- Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research [22540252, 23244030, 23340048] Funding Source: KAKEN
- Division Of Astronomical Sciences
- Direct For Mathematical & Physical Scien [0907893] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
- Science and Technology Facilities Council [ST/G009465/1, ST/J001600/1] Funding Source: researchfish
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We present time-resolved broadband observations of the quasar 3C 279 obtained from multi-wavelength campaigns conducted during the first two years of the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope mission. While investigating the previously reported gamma-ray/optical flare accompanied by a change in optical polarization, we found that the optical emission appears to be delayed with respect to the gamma-ray emission by about 10 days. X-ray observations reveal a pair of isolated flares separated by similar to 90 days, with only weak gamma-ray/optical counterparts. The spectral structure measured by Spitzer reveals a synchrotron component peaking in the mid-infrared band with a sharp break at the far-infrared band during the gamma-ray flare, while the peak appears in the millimeter (mm)/submillimeter (sub-mm) band in the low state. Selected spectral energy distributions are fitted with leptonic models including Comptonization of external radiation produced in a dusty torus or the broad-line region. Adopting the interpretation of the polarization swing involving propagation of the emitting region along a curved trajectory, we can explain the evolution of the broadband spectra during the gamma-ray flaring event by a shift of its location from similar to 1 pc to similar to 4 pc from the central black hole. On the other hand, if the gamma-ray flare is generated instead at sub-pc distance from the central black hole, the far-infrared break can be explained by synchrotron self-absorption. We also model the low spectral state, dominated by the mm/sub-mm peaking synchrotron component, and suggest that the corresponding inverse-Compton component explains the steady X-ray emission.
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