• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.31 no.2
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• pp.101-120
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• 2014

The nature of the exotic stellar corpses which reincarnate by consuming their companion is reviewed. Apart from sucking life from their partners, they are actually eating the doomed companions away by their deadly and powerful particle/radiation beams. Such situation resembles that a female "black widow" spider that eats its mate after mating. These celestial zombies are called - Millisecond pulsars (MSPs). In this review article, I will focus on the effort of Fermi Asian Network (FAN) in exploring these intricating objects over the last five years. Two special classes of MSPs are particularly striking. Since Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope has started surveying the gamma-ray sky, the population of "black widows" has been boosted. Another dramatic class is so-called "redbacks" (Australian cousin of "black widows") which has just emerged in the last few years. These MSPs provide us with a long-sought missing link in understanding the transition between accretion-powered and rotation-powered systems. The strategy of hunting MSPs through mulitwavelength observations of the unidentified Fermi objects is also reviewed.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.41 no.2
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• pp.60.2-60.2
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• 2016

We present recent results of very long baseline interferometry (VLBI) observations of gamma-ray bright active galactic nuclei (AGNs) using Korean VLBI Network (KVN) at 22, 43, 86, and 129~GHz bands, which are part of a KVN key science program; Interferometric Monitoring of Gamma-ray Bright AGNs (iMOGABA). We selected a total of 34 radio-loud AGNs of which 30 sources are gamma-ray bright AGNs, including 24 sources monitored by the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope using the Large Area Telescope on board. The selected sources consist of 24 quasars, 7 BL Lacs, and 3 radio galaxies. In this talk, we summarize recent results of the iMOGABA, including results of single-epoch multi-frequency VLBI observations of the target sources, conducted during a 24-hr session on 2013 November 19 and 20. All observed sources were detected and imaged at all frequency bands with or without a frequency phase transfer technique which enabled to detect and image 12 faint sources at 129 GHz, except for 0218+357 which was detected for only one baseline at all frequency bands.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.36 no.2
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• pp.55.2-55.2
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• 2011

We present the current research activities of the Center for the Exploration of the Origin of the Universe, a center established at Seoul National University with the Creative Research Initiative program. Our activities focus on observational studies of distant objects such as gamma-ray bursts, quasars, and proto-cluster of galaxies, but we also carry out other observational and theoretical studies in related topics. We also developed a new instrument, Camera for Quasars at Early Universe (CQUEAN) in collaboration with Kyunghee University group, and have secured observing facilities such as UKIRT and McDonald 2.1m observatory. Our research highlights include results such as the discovery of high redshift quasars and gamma ray bursts, the discovery of tidal disruption event at z=0.38 and peculiar gamma ray burst events, analysis of proto-clusters of galaxies, the discovery of brown dwarfs, and development of CQUEAN and its usage at the McDonald observatory.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.127-132
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• 2013

Here we review the effort of Fermi Asian Network (FAN) in exploring the supernova remnants (SNRs) with state-of-art high energy observatories, including Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope and Chandra X-ray Observatory, in the period of 2011- 2012. Utilizing the data from Fermi LAT, we have discovered the GeV emission at the position of the Galactic SNR Kes 17 which provides evidence for the hadronic acceleration. Our study also sheds light on the propagation of cosmic rays from their acceleration site to the intersteller medium. We have also launched an identification campaign of SNR candidates in the Milky Way, in which a new SNR G308.3-1.4 have been uncovered with our Chandra observation. Apart from the remnant, we have also discovered an associated compact object at its center. The multiwavelength properties of this X-ray source suggest it can possibly be the compact binary that survived a supernova explosion.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.59-64
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• 1998

Kim & Beuermann (1995, 1996)have developed a model for the propagation of X-rays from the accreting white dwarfthrough the infalling material and the re-emission of the energy deposited by photo-absorption in the optical (and UV) spectral range. By using this model, we calculate the profiles of the $H_{\gamma}$ emission-line spectrum of intermediate polars. Photoabsorption of X-ray by the infalling material is the dominant process in forming the observed energy-dependent rotational modulation of the X-ray flux. X-ray and optical modulations are sensitive to model parameters in different ways. In principle, these dependencies allow us to obtain improved insight into the accretion geometry of the intermediate polars. We present results of our calculations and compare them with the $H{\beta}$ line spectrum(Kim & Beuermann 1996).

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.46 no.1
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• pp.36.5-37
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• 2021

Gamma-ray binaries는 밀집성(중성자별과 블랙홀)과 질량이 큰 동반성 (>20 Msun)이 서로 공전하는 시스템이다. 이러한 시스템은 X선 영역에서 공전 주기에 따른 변광을 보이는 특징을 갖고 있는데, 이를 설명하기 위해 intrabinary shock(IBS) 모델을 이용한다. IBS는 두 천체의 항성풍이 상호작용하여 만들어내는 shock인데, 이 shock에서 가속된 입자들이 싱크로트론 기작을 통하여 X선 복사를 한다고 알려져 있다. 복사의 강도는 shock의 기하구조 변화 때문에 밀집성의 공전 위상에 따라서 주기적으로 변하는데, 이를 모형화하여 관측 데이터와 비교함으로써 궤도와 shock의 특성을 알아낼 수 있다. 이 발표에서는 IBS 모델을 설명하고, 이 모델을 매우 복잡한 X선 광도곡선을 보이는 gamma-ray binaries 중 하나인 HESS J0632+057에 적용한다. 그 결과로 이 천체계의 궤도를 추정하고, 동반성 disk와 shock의 상호작용 특성을 파악해보았다.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.111-112
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• 1999

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.123-125
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• 2013

2FGL J1823.8+4312 and 2FGL J1304.1-2415 are two unidentified Fermi objects which are associated with cluster of galaxies. In order to exam the possibility of cluster of galaxies as gamma-ray emitters, we search for counterpart of these two unidentified Fermi objects in other wavebands. However, we find other candidate to be more likely the counterpart of the unidentified Fermi object for both sources. We compare their light curves and SEDs in order to identify their source types. However, data at millimeter and sub-millimeter wavebands, which is important for us to constrain the SED at synchrotron peak, is lacking of measurement. Therefore, we proposed to SMA observation for these two sources. We have got data and are doing further analysis.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.39 no.2
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• pp.60.1-60.1
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• 2014

In the center of an Active Galactic Nuclei(AGN) is a supermassive black hole which accretes matter from its surroundings. The radio-loud AGN launch two relativistic jets perpendicular to the accretion disk which terminates into radio lobes located up to megaparsec away. Blazars form a small subset of radio-loud AGNs with one of two relativistic jets pointing toward the observer's line of sight. Many blazars often show flares at different frequencies. And these flares at different frequencies are known that they often correlate with each other. In 2013 December, there was a gamma-ray flare in 3C 279, one of the brightest blazars, Dec 2013. So we want to reveal that whether this flare correlates with radio flare or not, and where the flare originate. With polarization observation at radio frequencies, we can study the physical properties of the magnetic field in the innermost regions of the relativistic jets. Therefore, we have conducted polarization monitoring of this source from Dec. 2013 to Jun. 2014 with KVN(Korea VLBI Network) radio telescopes at 22, 43 and 86GHz. Here we present the initial results of the monitoring of 3C 279. We prospect that we can reveal the origin of this gamma-ray flare by comparing with our radio data.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.31 no.4
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• pp.317-323
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• 2014

Odyssey, one of the NASA's Mars exploration program and SELENE (Kaguya), a Japanese lunar orbiting spacecraft have a payload of Gamma-Ray Spectrometer (GRS) for analyzing radioactive chemical elements of the atmosphere and the surface. In these days, gamma-ray spectroscopy with a High-Purity Germanium (HPGe) detector has been widely used for the activity measurements of natural radionuclides contained in the soil of the Earth. The energy spectra obtained by the HPGe detectors have been generally analyzed by means of the Window Analysis (WA) method. In this method, activity concentrations are determined by using the net counts of energy window around individual peaks. Meanwhile, an alternative method, the so-called Full Spectrum Analysis (FSA) method uses count numbers not only from full-absorption peaks but from the contributions of Compton scattering due to gamma-rays. Consequently, while it takes a substantial time to obtain a statistically significant result in the WA method, the FSA method requires a much shorter time to reach the same level of the statistical significance. This study shows the validation results of FSA method. We have compared the concentration of radioactivity of $^{40}K$, $^{232}Th$ and $^{238}U$ in the soil measured by the WA method and the FSA method, respectively. The gamma-ray spectrum of reference materials (RGU and RGTh, KCl) and soil samples were measured by the 120% HPGe detector with cosmic muon veto detector. According to the comparison result of activity concentrations between the FSA and the WA, we could conclude that FSA method is validated against the WA method. This study implies that the FSA method can be used in a harsh measurement environment, such as the gamma-ray measurement in the Moon, in which the level of statistical significance is usually required in a much shorter data acquisition time than the WA method.