FORTH Institute of Astrophysics

We present the results of a search for continuous gravitational wave signals (CGWs) in the second data release (DR2) of the European Pulsar Timing Array (EPTA) Collaboration. The most significant candidate event from this search has a gravitational wave frequency of 4–5 nHz. Such a signal could be generated by a supermassive black hole binary (SMBHB) in the local Universe. We present the results of a follow-up analysis of this candidate using both Bayesian and frequentist methods. The Bayesian analysis gives a Bayes factor of 4 in favour of the presence of the CGW over a common uncorrelated noise process. In contrast, the frequentist analysis estimates the p-value of the candidate to be < 1%, also assuming the presence of common uncorrelated red noise. However, comparing a model that includes both a CGW and a gravitational wave background (GWB) to a GWB only, the Bayes factor in favour of the CGW model is only 0.7. Therefore, we cannot conclusively determine the origin of the observed feature, nor can we rule it out as a CGW source. We present results of simulations that demonstrate that data containing a weak gravitational wave background can be misinterpreted as data including a CGW and vice versa, providing two plausible explanations for the EPTA DR2 data. Further investigations combining data from all PTA collaborations will be needed to reveal the true origin of this feature.

Millisecond pulsars are extremely precise celestial clocks: as they rotate, the beamed radio waves emitted along the axis of their magnetic field can be detected with radio telescopes, which allows for tracking subtle changes in the pulsars' rotation periods. A possible effect on the period of a pulsar is given by a potential coupling to dark matter, in cases where it is modeled with an ``ultralight'' scalar field. In this paper, we consider a universal conformal coupling of the dark matter scalar to gravity, which in turn mediates an effective coupling between pulsars and dark matter. If the dark matter scalar field is changing in time, as expected in the Milky Way, this effective coupling produces a periodic modulation of the pulsar rotational frequency. By studying the time series of observed radio pulses collected by the European Pulsar Timing Array experiment, we present constraints on the coupling of dark matter, improving on existing bounds. These bounds can also be regarded as constraints on the parameters of scalar-tensor theories of the Fierz-Jordan-Brans-Dicke and Damour-Esposito-Far\`ese types in the presence of a (light) mass potential term.

This document presents a summary of the 2023 Terrestrial Very-Long-Baseline Atom Interferometry Workshop hosted by CERN. The workshop brought together experts from around the world to discuss the exciting developments in large-scale atom interferometer (AI) prototypes and their potential for detecting ultralight dark matter and gravitational waves. The primary objective of the workshop was to lay the groundwork for an international TVLBAI proto-collaboration. This collaboration aims to unite researchers from different institutions to strategize and secure funding for terrestrial large-scale AI projects. The ultimate goal is to create a roadmap detailing the design and technology choices for one or more kilometer--scale detectors, which will be operational in the mid-2030s. The key sections of this report present the physics case and technical challenges, together with a comprehensive overview of the discussions at the workshop together with the main conclusions.

The Gaia-ESO Survey is an European Southern Observatory (ESO) public spectroscopic survey that targeted 105 stars in the Milky Way covering the major populations of the disk, bulge and halo. The observations were made using FLAMES on the VLT obtaining both UVES high (R ~ 47 000) and GIRAFFE medium (R ~ 20 000) resolution spectra. The analysis of the Gaia-ESO spectra was the work of multiple analysis teams (nodes) within five working groups (WG). The homogenisation of the stellar parameters within WG11 (high resolution observations of FGK stars) and the homogenisation of the stellar parameters within WG10 (medium resolution observations of FGK stars) is described here. In both cases, the homogenisation was carried out using a Bayesian Inference method developed specifically for the Gaia-ESO Survey by WG11. The method was also used for the chemical abundance homogenisation within WG11, however, the WG10 chemical abundance data set was too sparsely populated so basic corrections for each node analysis were employed for the homogenisation instead. The WG10 homogenisation primarily used the cross-match of stars with WG11 as the reference set in both the stellar parameter and chemical abundance homogenisation. In this way the WG10 homogenised results have been placed directly onto the WG11 stellar parameter and chemical abundance scales. The reference set for the metal-poor end was sparse which limited the effectiveness of the homogenisation in that regime. For WG11, the total number of stars for which stellar parameters were derived was 6 231 with typical uncertainties for Teff, log g and [Fe/H] of 32 K, 0.05 and 0.05 respectively. One or more chemical abundances out of a possible 39 elements were derived for 6 188 of the stars. For WG10, the total number of stars for which stellar parameters were derived was 76 675 with typical uncertainties for Teff, log g and [Fe/H] of 64 K, 0.15 and 0.07 respectively. One or more chemical abundances out of a possible 30 elements were derived for 64177 of the stars.

Context. Blazar AO 0235+164, located at a redshift of z = 0.94, has undergone several sharp multi-spectral-range flaring episodes over recent decades. In particular, the episodes that peaked in 2008 and 2015, which were subject to extensive multi-wavelength coverage, exhibited an interesting behavior. Aims. We study the actual origin of these two observed flares by constraining the properties of the observed photo-polarimetric variability as well as of the broadband spectral energy distribution and the observed time-evolution behavior of the source. We use ultra-high-resolution total-flux and polarimetric very-long-baseline interferometry (VLBI) imaging. Methods. The analysis of VLBI images allowed us to constrain kinematic and geometrical parameters of the 7 mm jet. We used the discrete correlation function to compute the statistical correlation and the delays between emission at different spectral ranges. The multi-epoch modeling of the spectral energy distributions allowed us to propose specific models of the emission; in particular, with the aim to model the unusual spectral features observed in this source in the X-ray region of the spectrum during strong multi spectral-range flares. Results. We find that these X-ray spectral features can be explained by an emission component originating in a separate particle distribution than the one responsible for the two standard blazar bumps. This is in agreement with the results of our correlation analysis, where we did not find a strong correlation between the X-ray and the remaining spectral ranges. We find that both external Compton-dominated and synchrotron self-Compton-dominated models are able to explain the observed spectral energy distributions. However, the synchrotron self-Compton models are strongly favored by the delays and geometrical parameters inferred from the observations.

<p><img src="" alt="" width="404" height="400" /></p> <p>The pandemic crisis has reshaped the landscape of formal education worldwide and caused critical challenges for teachers. The most encountered issues can be listed as follows; keeping students motivated to actively engage them in a virtual classroom, ensuring the learning outcomes of the lessons, and adapting their educational practice in a more inclusive and personalised approach to address different types of learners.</p> <p>In order to address the aforementioned challenges faced by teachers in the school environment, the Erasmus+ project LaSciL brings together schools in Europe, educational research institutions, outreach groups, and Large Scientific infrastructures in Physics. These include robotic telescopes and an astronomical observatory with a group of operators of large scientific infrastructures, education, and outreach specialists, together with school education experts. The aim is to enhance teachers’ digital competence by supporting high-quality science teaching in the classroom from a distance as well as supporting a long-term organisational restructuring of schools.</p> <p>LaSciL empowers and supports teachers to become more literate in using high-quality digital educational tools. In this framework, teachers shall be enabled to a) create their own opensource educational resources for their students’ distance learning; b) manage large numbers of students in an online environment by keeping them motivated to participate, c) maintain and enhance their science motivation and d) personalise their teaching practices tailored to the needs of their students. To achieve that, LaSciL demonstrates innovative ways to involve teachers and students in eScience by sharing and exploiting the collective power of highquality digital resources (research facilities, scientific instruments, advanced ICT (Information and Communication Technology) tools, simulation and visualisation applications, and scientific databases). The LaSciL project provides teachers with cutting-edge, curriculum-tailored educational scenarios that can be used, reused, and adapted to their needs, as well as act as a source of inspiration for the design of their own open educational content through active educational methodologies such as Inquiry based learning and Project based learning.</p> <p>Through careful monitoring and assessment of the teacher training and implementation with students, LaSciL develops a series of best practices and devises a roadmap both for supporting science teachers and proposing a new organisational framework to enable close collaborations between schools and research infrastructures. This connection demonstrates effective ways of involving a broader set of actors in the use of research infrastructures by<br />developing a framework of actions that will attract young people to science and pool talent to scientific careers.</p> <p>LaSciL presents both a short-term and a long-term vision. In the short term, we a) support the development of key teacher ICT competencies and digital readiness; b) produce a series of high-quality digital tools and educational resources ready to be implemented in the classroom and c) facilitate instruction in the pandemic era, maintaining and enhancing students’ science motivation and fascination without compromising the curriculum. In the long term, LaSciL envisions a new organisational framework for the collaboration between schools and research infrastructures.</p> <p>LaSciL promotes a culture of cooperation between research infrastructures, by spreading good practices among outreach groups of large-scale research infrastructures, encouraging them to develop their activities in complementary ways and to optimise their use by demonstrating how e-infrastructures, such as robotic telescopes, could support the vision of the science classroom of tomorrow.</p>

Galactic black-hole X-ray binaries (BHBs) emit a compact, optically thick, mildly relativistic radio jet when they are in the hard and hard-intermediate states. In these states, BHBs exhibit a correlation between the time lag of hard photons with respect to softer ones and the photon index of the power law component that characterizes the X-ray spectral continuum above $\sim$ 10 keV. The correlation, however, shows large scatter. Our objective is to investigate the role that the inclination of the system plays on the correlation between the time lag and the photon index. We find that the correlation between the time lag and the photon index is tight in low-inclination systems and becomes weaker in high-inclination systems. The amplitude of the lags is also larger at low and intermediate inclination angles than at high inclination. Our jet model that reproduces the process of Comptonization in an extended jet can account for the observations remarkably well.

Antivirus software are the most popular tools for detecting and stopping malicious or unwanted files. However, the performance requirements of traditional host-based antivirus make their wide adoption to mobile, embedded, and hand-held devices questionable. Their computational- and memory-intensive characteristics, which are needed to cope with the evolved and sophisticated malware, makes their deployment to mobile processors a hard task. Moreover, their increasing complexity may result in vulnerabilities that can be exploited by malware. In this paper, we first describe a GPU-based antivirus algorithm for Android devices. Then, due to the limited number of GPU-enabled Android devices, we present different architecture designs that exploit code offloading for running the antivirus on more powerful machines. This approach enables lower execution and memory overheads, better performance, and improved deployability and management. We evaluate the performance, scalability, and efficacy of the system in several different scenarios and setups. We show that the time to detect a malware is 8.4 times lower than the typical local execution approach.

Black-hole transients exhibit a correlation between the time lag of hard photons with respect to softer ones and the photon index of the hard X-ray power law. The correlation is not very tight and therefore it is necessary to examine it source by source. The objective of the present work is to investigate in detail the time-lag -- photon-index correlation in GX 339-4. We have obtained RXTE energy spectra and light curves and have computed the photon index and the time lag of the $9 - 15$ keV photons with respect to the $2 - 6$ keV ones. The observations cover the first stages of the hard state, the pure hard state, and the hard-intermediate state. At low $\Gamma$, the correlation is positive and it becomes negative at large $\Gamma$. By assuming that the hard X-ray power law index $\Gamma$ is produced by inverse Compton scattering of soft disk photons in the jet, we have reproduced the entire correlation by varying two parameters in the jet: the radius of the jet at its base $R_0$ and the Thomson optical depth along the jet $\tau_\parallel$. We have found that, as the luminosity of the source increases, $R_0$ initially increases and then decreases. This behavior is expected in the context of the Cosmic Battery. As a further test of our model, we predict the break frequency in the radio spectrum as a function of the photon index during the rising part of an outburst.

The source 4U 1901+03 is a high-mass X-ray pulsar than went into outburst in 2003. Observation performed with the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer showed spectral and timing variability, including the detection of flares, quasi-periodic oscillations, complex changes in the pulse profiles, and pulse phase dependent spectral variability. We re-analysed the data covering the 2003 X-ray outburst and focused on several aspects of the variability that have not been discussed so far. These are the 10 keV feature and the X-ray spectral states and their association with accretion regimes, including the transit to the propeller state at the end of the outburst. We find that 4U 1901+03 went through three accretion regimes over the course of the X-ray outburst. At the peak of the outburst and for a very short time, the X-ray flux may have overcome the critical limit that marks the formation of a radiative shock at a certain distance above the neutron star surface. Most of the time, however, the source is in the subcritical regime. Only at the end of the outburst, when the luminosity decreased below ~10^{36} (d/10 kpc)^2 erg/s, did the source enter the propeller regime. Evidence for the existence of these regimes comes from the pulse profiles, the shape of the hardness-intensity diagram, and the correlation of various spectral parameters with the flux. The 10 keV feature appears to strongly depend on the X-ray flux and on the pulse phase, which opens the possibility to interpret this feature as a cyclotron line.