Description du sujet de thèse

We present an opportunity to pursue a PhD in the context of multi-wavelength and multi-messenger (MM) astronomy. Full funding for this 3-year PhD at Laboratoire Leprince-Ringuet (joint research unit of the École Polytechnique and the CNRS) is available through the “MOTS (Multi-messenger Observations of the Transient Sky)” programme [0], funded by the French Agence Nationale de Recherche (ANR). The successful candidate will undertake their PhD research at LLR, working closely with three researchers of the team. The PhD student will exploit observations made by the state-of-the-art gamma-ray observatories, Fermi-LAT [1], H.E.S.S. [2], and CTA [3] and will contribute to the development of TeVCat [4], a catalogue for TeV gamma-ray astronomy.

The activities during the thesis will be the following:
- Undertaking data-analysis “shifts” within the LAT Collaboration and H.E.S.S Collaboration to monitor the gamma-ray sky for sporadic emission from active galactic nuclei and from gamma-ray bursts (GRBs)
- Analysis of Fermi-LAT / H.E.S.S. data on transients
- Participation in the commissioning of CTA (including the possibility to travel to the
Northern Site at La Palma)
- Development of TeVCat
- Regular progress reports during group meetings and during monthly MOTS meetings
- Participation in weekly teleconferences within the various collaborations
- Participation in collaboration meetings
- Preparation of scientific papers describing analysis and results in collaboration with
colleagues
- Attendance of scientific conferences/workshops to present results

Contexte de travail

These are exciting times for multi-messenger (MM) transient astronomy. The first joint detection of gravitational waves (GW) from the binary neutron star merger GW 170817 [5], of its electromagnetic counterpart in form of the short gamma-ray burst GRB 170817A, and of the subsequent kilonova signified the dawn of a new MM era. Recently, very-high-energy (TeV) gamma-ray emission has also been discovered from GRBs [6] and, in October 2022, an extremely luminous GRB, GRB 221009A was detected. Dubbed the “BOAT” (brightest of all time) by the press, this GRB has already garnered many preprints due to the claimed detection of 18 TeV photons [7]. The IceCube Collaboration recently announced the association of high-energy neutrinos with the nearby active galaxy NGC 1068, further strengthening the link between active galactic nuclei and high-energy neutrino emission [8].

[0] MOTS: https://www.multimessenger-astronomy.com/mots.html [1] Fermi-LAT: https://fermi.gsfc.nasa.gov/
[2] H.E.S.S.: https://www.mpi-hd.mpg.de/HESS/
[3] CTA: https://www.cta-observatory.org/
[4] TeVCat: http://tevcat.in2p3.fr/
[5] MM Observations of a Binary Neutron Star Merger: https://arxiv.org/abs/1710.05833 [6] GRB 180720B detection by H.E.S.S.: https://arxiv.org/abs/1911.08961
[7] See references here: http://tevcat2.uchicago.edu/sources/S2jO4c
[8] Evidence for neutrino emission from NGC 1068: https://arxiv.org/abs/2211.09972

Contraintes et risques

Missions in France and abroad are possible within the framework of collaborations with colleagues, collaboration meetings and attendance of scientific conferences/workshops.