An Outburst of GeV Gamma-Ray Emission from Centaurus X-3

摘要

Our phase analysis, employing contemporaneous X-ray pulse observations by CGRO BATSE, indicates modulation of the gamma-ray emission at the pulsar's spin frequency with a significance level higher than 99.5/100. Straightforward interpretation of the EGRET measurements requires at least sporadic accel- eration of GeV particles within the Cen X-3 binary system. The observations also suggest that Galactic X-ray binary systems may constitute a class of highly variable GeV gamma-ray sources.