Studying the role of supernova remnants as cosmic ray PeVatron with LHAASO observations

Abstract

It is commonly believed that galactic cosmic rays are produced in supernova remnants (SNRs) and accelerated via a diffusive shock acceleration (DSA) mechanism in supernova blast waves driven by expanding SNRs. The latest theoretical advancement of the diffusive shock acceleration hypothesis in SNRs shows that cosmic rays may be accelerated up to the knee energy of the observed cosmic ray spectrum under the amplified magnetic field scenario. There is, however, no empirical evidence to support SNRs as sources of hadrons with energies larger than a few tens of TeV. Very recently, LHAASO observatory reported the very high-energy gamma ray emission between TeV to PeV energy range from two SNRs, Cassiopeia A and IC 443. Above 25 TeV energies, non-detection of gamma-ray flux by LHAASO yields a strong upper limit. In this work, we investigate the implications of the acceleration of cosmic ray protons in the SNR on energetic gamma rays produced in the hadronic interaction of cosmic rays with ambient matter. Our findings imply that when we consider the highest attainable energy of cosmic ray protons in the SNRs to be about 100 TeV, the observed gamma-ray spectra from the two SNRs can be described consistently. Therefore, we conclude that the Cassiopia A and IC 443 SNRs are unlikely to be cosmic ray PeVatrons.