Paper detail

Mechanism of very high energy radiation in BL Lacertae object 3C 66A

Our goal is to understand the nature of blazars and the mechanisms for the generation of high-energy $γ$-rays, through the investigation of the blazar 3C 66A. We model the high energy spectrum of 3C 66A, which has been observed recently with the Fermi-LAT and VERITAS telescope. The spectrum has a hard change from the energy range of 0.2-100 GeV to 200-500 GeV in recent almost contemporaneous observations of two telescopes. The de-absorbed VERITAS spectrum greatly depends on the redshift, which is highly uncertain. If z=0.444 is adopted, we are able to use the SSC model to produce the Fermi-LAT component and the EC model to the VERITAS component. However, if z=0.1, the intrinsic VERITAS spectrum will be softer, there will be a smooth link between the Fermi-LAT and VERITAS spectra which can be explained using a SSC model.