Distortions in Periodicity Analysis of Blazars: The Impact of Flares

Fuente: arXiv
Salvato in:
Dettagli Bibliografici
Autori principali: Peñil, Pablo, Torres-Albà, Nuria, Rico, Alba, Ajello, Marco, Buson, Sara, Adhikari, Sagar
Natura: Preprint
Pubblicazione: 2025
Soggetti:
Accesso online:
Tags: Aggiungi Tag
Nessun Tag, puoi essere il primo ad aggiungerne!!
_version_ 1866910905448529920
author Peñil, Pablo
Torres-Albà, Nuria
Rico, Alba
Ajello, Marco
Buson, Sara
Adhikari, Sagar
author_facet Peñil, Pablo
Torres-Albà, Nuria
Rico, Alba
Ajello, Marco
Buson, Sara
Adhikari, Sagar
contents Blazars, a unique class of active galactic nuclei, exhibit highly variable emission across the electromagnetic spectrum. This variability frequently manifests as intense flaring events, sparking an ongoing debate in recent literature about whether these flares exhibit periodic behavior in certain sources. However, many blazars also show clear signs of stochastic, uncorrelated flares that do not follow a regular pattern. This paper explores how the presence of one such of these stochastic flares can distort an intrinsically periodic pattern of emission in blazars. Our results demonstrate that, depending on the specific circumstances, the deviations in significance and periods can exceed 100\%. Sometimes, these deviations can be so severe that they eliminate any evidence of a periodic pattern. These findings highlight the dramatic impact that flares can have on periodicity searches. To confront this challenge, we propose an innovative approach, the Singular Spectrum Analysis method, which appears more robust against the effects of flares. As an alternative solution, we also propose the sigma clipping technique to mitigate the impact of flares. This framework offers a valuable foundation for analyzing periodicity in similar astrophysical sources that are also subject to stochastic flaring events.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2504_05092
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Distortions in Periodicity Analysis of Blazars: The Impact of Flares
Peñil, Pablo
Torres-Albà, Nuria
Rico, Alba
Ajello, Marco
Buson, Sara
Adhikari, Sagar
High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena
Blazars, a unique class of active galactic nuclei, exhibit highly variable emission across the electromagnetic spectrum. This variability frequently manifests as intense flaring events, sparking an ongoing debate in recent literature about whether these flares exhibit periodic behavior in certain sources. However, many blazars also show clear signs of stochastic, uncorrelated flares that do not follow a regular pattern. This paper explores how the presence of one such of these stochastic flares can distort an intrinsically periodic pattern of emission in blazars. Our results demonstrate that, depending on the specific circumstances, the deviations in significance and periods can exceed 100\%. Sometimes, these deviations can be so severe that they eliminate any evidence of a periodic pattern. These findings highlight the dramatic impact that flares can have on periodicity searches. To confront this challenge, we propose an innovative approach, the Singular Spectrum Analysis method, which appears more robust against the effects of flares. As an alternative solution, we also propose the sigma clipping technique to mitigate the impact of flares. This framework offers a valuable foundation for analyzing periodicity in similar astrophysical sources that are also subject to stochastic flaring events.
title Distortions in Periodicity Analysis of Blazars: The Impact of Flares
topic High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2504.05092