Probing photon-ALP oscillations from the MAGIC observations of FSRQ QSO B1420+326

Abstract

At the beginning of 2020, MAGIC reported a very-high-energy (VHE) flaring activity from the FSRQ QSO B1420+326. It is now the fourth known most distant blazar (z=0.682) with an observed VHE gamma-ray emission. In this work, we investigate the effect of photon-axionlike particle (ALP) oscillations in the gamma-ray spectra measured by Fermi-LAT and MAGIC around the flaring state. We set 95% C.L. upper limit on the ALP parameters and obtain a constraint on the photon-ALP coupling constant $g_{a\gamma }<2\times 10^{-11}$ GeV${}^{-1}$ for ALP masses $m_a\sim 10^{-10}-10^{-9}$ eV. Assuming the hadronic origin of VHE photons, we also estimate the expected neutrino flux from this source and the contribution to diffuse neutrino flux from QSO B1420+326-like FSRQs at sub-PeV energies. Furthermore, we study the implications of photon-ALP oscillations on the counterpart $\gamma$-rays of the sub-PeV neutrinos. Finally, we investigate a viable scenario of invisible neutrino decay to ALPs on the gamma-ray spectra and diffuse $\gamma$-ray flux at sub-PeV energies. Interestingly, we find that for the choice of neutrino lifetime ${\tau }_2/m_2=10^3$ s eV${}^{-1}$, the $\gamma$-ray flux has a good observational sensitivity towards LHAASO-KM2A.

Comments: 11 pages, 7 figures; Published version