Limits on Particle Acceleration by Black Holes in X-Ray Binaries
W. Thomas Vestrand
P. Sreekumar
Mark L. McConnell
Abstract
A large body of theoretical work predicts the production of gamma-ray
emission by stellar mass black hole canidates. We report on our effort
to detect high-energy gamma-ray emission from a large sample of black
hole candidates with the COMPTEL and EGRET telescopes. Our typical
limits on gamma-ray luminosity from black hole candiates are L(1-30
MeV) = 1035D2kpc erg/sec and L( > 100 MeV) = 7×1033D2kpc erg/sec. The failure to detect Cygnus X-1, for example,
limits the steady-state luminosity above 100 MeV to less than
10-4 of the Eddington luminosity for the system. We discuss the
important constraints these observations place on particle acceleration in black
hole binary systems.
File translated from TEX by TTH, version 2.32.
On 2 Aug 1999, 16:05.