| Title | Bayesian framework to constrain the photon mass with a catalog of fast radio bursts |
| Authors | Shao, Lijing Zhang, Bing |
| Affiliation | Albert Einstein Inst, Max Planck Inst Gravitat Phys, Muhlenberg 1, D-14476 Potsdam, Germany. Univ Nevada, Dept Phys & Astron, Las Vegas, NV 89154 USA. Peking Univ, Kavli Inst Astron & Astrophys, Beijing 100871, Peoples R China. Peking Univ, Sch Phys, Dept Astron, Beijing 100871, Peoples R China. Albert Einstein Inst, Max Planck Inst Gravitat Phys, Muhlenberg 1, D-14476 Potsdam, Germany. Zhang, B (reprint author), Univ Nevada, Dept Phys & Astron, Las Vegas, NV 89154 USA. Zhang, B (reprint author), Peking Univ, Kavli Inst Astron & Astrophys, Beijing 100871, Peoples R China. Zhang, B (reprint author), Peking Univ, Sch Phys, Dept Astron, Beijing 100871, Peoples R China. |
| Keywords | GAMMA-RAY BURSTS REST MASS REIONIZATION HISTORY COSMIC REIONIZATION MAGNETIC-FIELD HOST GALAXY FRB 121102 LIMITS LIGHT LOCALIZATION |
| Issue Date | 2017 |
| Publisher | PHYSICAL REVIEW D |
| Citation | PHYSICAL REVIEW D.2017,95(12). |
| Abstract | A hypothetical photon mass, m(gamma), gives an energy-dependent light speed in a Lorentz-invariant theory. Such a modification causes an additional time delay between photons of different energies when they travel through a fixed distance. Fast radio bursts (FRBs), with their short time duration and cosmological propagation distance, are excellent astrophysical objects to constrain m(gamma). Here for the first time we develop a Bayesian framework to study this problem with a catalog of FRBs. Those FRBs with and without redshift measurement are both useful in this framework, and can be combined in a Bayesian way. A catalog of 21 FRBs (including 20 FRBs without redshift measurement, and one, FRB 121102, with a measured redshift z = 0.19273 +/- 0.00008) give a combined limit m(gamma) <= 8.7 x 10(-51) kg, or equivalently m gamma <= 4.9 x 10(-15) eV= c(2) (m(gamma) <= 1.5 x 10(-50) kg, or equivalently m(gamma) <= 8.4 x 10(-15) eV= c(2)) at 68% (95%) confidence level, which represents the best limit that comes purely from kinematics. The framework proposed here will be valuable when FRBs are observed daily in the future. Increment in the number of FRBs, and refinement in the knowledge about the electron distributions in the Milky Way, the host galaxies of FRBs, and the intergalactic medium, will further tighten the constraint. |
| URI | http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11897/472760 |
| ISSN | 2470-0010 |
| DOI | 10.1103/PhysRevD.95.123010 |
| Indexed | SCI(E) |
| Appears in Collections: | 科维理天文与天体物理研究所 物理学院 |
