Testing the ubiquitous presence of very high energy emission in gamma-ray bursts with the MAGIC telescopes

S. Abe; J. Abhir; A. Abhishek; V. A. Acciari; A. Aguasca-Cabot; I. Agudo; T. Aniello; S. Ansoldi; L. A. Antonelli; A. Arbet Engels; C. Arcaro; T. T. H. Arnesen; K. Asano; A. Babić; C. Bakshi; U. Barres de Almeida; J. A. Barrio; L. Barrios-Jiménez; I. Batković; J. Baxter; J. Becerra González; W. Bednarek; E. Bernardini; J. Bernete; A. Berti; J. Besenrieder; C. Bigongiari; A. Biland; O. Blanch; G. Bonnoli; Ž. Bošnjak; E. Bronzini; I. Burelli; A. Campoy-Ordaz; A. Carosi; R. Carosi; M. Carretero-Castrillo; A. J. Castro-Tirado; D. Cerasole; G. Ceribella; Y. Chai; A. Cifuentes; J. L. Contreras; J. Cortina; S. Covino; G. D’Amico; P. Da Vela; F. Dazzi; A. De Angelis; B. De Lotto; R. de Menezes; M. Delfino; J. Delgado; C. Delgado Mendez; F. Di Pierro; R. Di Tria; L. Di Venere; A. Dinesh; D. Dominis Prester; A. Donini; D. Dorner; M. Doro; L. Eisenberger; D. Elsaesser; J. Escudero; L. Fariña; A. Fattorini; L. Foffano; L. Font; S. Fröse; S. Fukami; Y. Fukazawa; R. J. García López; S. García Soto; M. Garczarczyk; S. Gasparyan; M. Gaug; J. G. Giesbrecht Paiva; N. Giglietto; F. Giordano; P. Gliwny; N. Godinović; T. Gradetzke; R. Grau; D. Green; J. G. Green; P. Günther; D. Hadasch; A. Hahn; T. Hassan; L. Heckmann; J. Herrera Llorente; D. Hrupec; R. Imazawa; S. Inoue; D. Israyelyan; J. Jahanvi; I. Jiménez Martínez; J. Jiménez Quiles; J. Jormanainen; S. Kankkunen; T. Kayanoki; J. Konrad; P. M. Kouch; H. Kubo; J. Kushida; M. Láinez; A. Lamastra; E. Lindfors; S. Lombardi; F. Longo; R. López-Coto; M. López-Moya; A. López-Oramas; S. Loporchio; L. Lulić; E. Lyard; P. Majumdar; M. Makariev; M. Mallamaci; G. Maneva; M. Manganaro; S. Mangano; K. Mannheim; S. Marchesi; M. Mariotti; M. Martínez; P. Maruševec; A. Mas-Aguilar; D. Mazin; S. Menchiari; J. Méndez Gallego; S. Menon; D. Miceli; J. M. Miranda; R. Mirzoyan; M. Molero González; E. Molina; H. A. Mondal; A. Moralejo; E. Moretti; T. Nakamori; C. Nanci; L. Nava; V. Neustroev; L. Nickel; M. Nievas Rosillo; C. Nigro; L. Nikolić; K. Nilsson; K. Nishijima; K. Noda; S. Nozaki; A. Okumura; J. Otero-Santos; S. Paiano; D. Paneque; R. Paoletti; J. M. Paredes; M. Peresano; M. Persic; M. Pihet; G. Pirola; F. Podobnik; P. G. Prada Moroni; E. Prandini; M. Ribó; J. Rico; C. Righi; N. Sahakyan; T. Saito; F. G. Saturni; K. Schmitz; F. Schmuckermaier; A. Sciaccaluga; G. Silvestri; A. Simongini; J. Sitarek; V. Sliusar; D. Sobczynska; A. Stamerra; J. Strišković; D. Strom; M. Strzys; Y. Suda; H. Tajima; M. Takahashi; R. Takeishi; P. Temnikov; K. Terauchi; T. Terzić; M. Teshima; A. Tutone; S. Ubach; J. van Scherpenberg; M. Vazquez Acosta; S. Ventura; G. Verna; I. Viale; A. Vigliano; C. F. Vigorito; E. Visentin; V. Vitale; I. Vovk; R. Walter; F. Wersig; M. Will; T. Yamamoto; P. K. H. Yeung

doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202555468

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Volume 700 (August 2025)

A&A, 700 (2025) A96

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Issue		A&A Volume 700, August 2025


Article Number		A96
Number of page(s)		15
Section		Extragalactic astronomy
DOI		https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202555468
Published online		08 August 2025

A&A, 700, A96 (2025)

Testing the ubiquitous presence of very high energy emission in gamma-ray bursts with the MAGIC telescopes

S. Abe¹, J. Abhir², A. Abhishek³, V. A. Acciari⁴, A. Aguasca-Cabot⁵, I. Agudo⁶, T. Aniello⁷, S. Ansoldi⁸^,43, L. A. Antonelli⁷, A. Arbet Engels⁹, C. Arcaro¹⁰, T. T. H. Arnesen¹¹, K. Asano¹, A. Babić¹², C. Bakshi¹³, U. Barres de Almeida¹⁴, J. A. Barrio¹⁵, L. Barrios-Jiménez¹¹, I. Batković¹⁰, J. Baxter¹, J. Becerra González¹¹, W. Bednarek¹⁶, E. Bernardini¹⁰, J. Bernete¹⁷, A. Berti⁹^⋆, J. Besenrieder⁹, C. Bigongiari⁷, A. Biland², O. Blanch⁴, G. Bonnoli⁷, Ž. Bošnjak¹², E. Bronzini⁷, I. Burelli⁴, A. Campoy-Ordaz¹⁸, A. Carosi⁷, R. Carosi¹⁹, M. Carretero-Castrillo⁵, A. J. Castro-Tirado⁶, D. Cerasole²⁰, G. Ceribella⁹, Y. Chai¹, A. Cifuentes¹⁷, J. L. Contreras¹⁵, J. Cortina¹⁷, S. Covino⁷^,44, G. D’Amico²¹, P. Da Vela⁷, F. Dazzi⁷, A. De Angelis¹⁰, B. De Lotto⁸, R. de Menezes²², M. Delfino⁴^,45, J. Delgado⁴^,45, C. Delgado Mendez¹⁷, F. Di Pierro²², R. Di Tria²⁰, L. Di Venere²⁰, A. Dinesh¹⁵, D. Dominis Prester²³, A. Donini⁷, D. Dorner²⁴, M. Doro¹⁰, L. Eisenberger²⁴, D. Elsaesser²⁵, J. Escudero⁶, L. Fariña⁴, A. Fattorini²⁵, L. Foffano⁷, L. Font¹⁸, S. Fröse²⁵, S. Fukami¹, Y. Fukazawa²⁶, R. J. García López¹¹, S. García Soto¹⁷, M. Garczarczyk²⁷, S. Gasparyan²⁸, M. Gaug¹⁸, J. G. Giesbrecht Paiva¹⁴, N. Giglietto²⁰, F. Giordano²⁰, P. Gliwny¹⁶, N. Godinović²⁹, T. Gradetzke²⁵, R. Grau⁴, D. Green⁹, J. G. Green⁹, P. Günther²⁴, D. Hadasch¹, A. Hahn⁹, T. Hassan¹⁷, L. Heckmann⁹^,46, J. Herrera Llorente¹¹, D. Hrupec³⁰, R. Imazawa²⁶, S. Inoue¹^,38, D. Israyelyan²⁸, J. Jahanvi⁸, I. Jiménez Martínez⁹, J. Jiménez Quiles⁴, J. Jormanainen³¹, S. Kankkunen³¹, T. Kayanoki²⁶, J. Konrad²⁵, P. M. Kouch³¹, H. Kubo¹, J. Kushida³², M. Láinez¹⁵, A. Lamastra⁷, E. Lindfors³¹, S. Lombardi⁷, F. Longo⁸^,47^⋆, R. López-Coto⁶, M. López-Moya¹⁵, A. López-Oramas¹¹, S. Loporchio²⁰, L. Lulić²³, E. Lyard³³, P. Majumdar¹³, M. Makariev³⁴, M. Mallamaci³⁵, G. Maneva³⁴, M. Manganaro²³, S. Mangano¹⁷, K. Mannheim²⁴, S. Marchesi⁷, M. Mariotti¹⁰, M. Martínez⁴, P. Maruševec¹², A. Mas-Aguilar¹⁵, D. Mazin¹^,48, S. Menchiari⁶, J. Méndez Gallego⁶, S. Menon⁷, D. Miceli¹⁰^⋆, J. M. Miranda³, R. Mirzoyan⁹, M. Molero González¹¹, E. Molina¹¹, H. A. Mondal¹³, A. Moralejo⁴, E. Moretti⁴, T. Nakamori³⁶, C. Nanci⁷, L. Nava⁷^⋆, V. Neustroev³⁷, L. Nickel²⁵, M. Nievas Rosillo¹¹, C. Nigro⁴, L. Nikolić³, K. Nilsson³¹, K. Nishijima³², K. Noda³⁸, S. Nozaki¹, A. Okumura³⁹, J. Otero-Santos¹⁰, S. Paiano⁷, D. Paneque⁹, R. Paoletti³, J. M. Paredes⁵, M. Peresano⁹, M. Persic⁸^,49, M. Pihet⁵, G. Pirola⁹, F. Podobnik³, P. G. Prada Moroni¹⁹, E. Prandini¹⁰, M. Ribó⁵, J. Rico⁴, C. Righi⁷, N. Sahakyan²⁸, T. Saito¹, F. G. Saturni⁷, K. Schmitz²⁵, F. Schmuckermaier⁹, A. Sciaccaluga⁷, G. Silvestri¹⁰, A. Simongini⁷, J. Sitarek¹⁶, V. Sliusar³³, D. Sobczynska¹⁶, A. Stamerra⁷, J. Strišković³⁰, D. Strom⁹, M. Strzys¹, Y. Suda²⁶, H. Tajima³⁹, M. Takahashi³⁹, R. Takeishi¹, P. Temnikov³⁴, K. Terauchi⁴⁰, T. Terzić²³, M. Teshima⁹^,50, A. Tutone⁷, S. Ubach¹⁸, J. van Scherpenberg⁹, M. Vazquez Acosta¹¹, S. Ventura³, G. Verna³, I. Viale²², A. Vigliano⁸, C. F. Vigorito²², E. Visentin²², V. Vitale⁴¹, I. Vovk¹, R. Walter³³, F. Wersig²⁵, M. Will⁹, T. Yamamoto⁴² and P. K. H. Yeung¹

¹ Japanese MAGIC Group: Institute for Cosmic Ray Research (ICRR), The University of Tokyo, Kashiwa, 277-8582 Chiba, Japan
² ETH Zürich, CH-8093 Zürich, Switzerland
³ Università di Siena and INFN Pisa, I-53100 Siena, Italy
⁴ Institut de Física d’Altes Energies (IFAE), The Barcelona Institute of Science and Technology (BIST), E-08193 Bellaterra (Barcelona), Spain
⁵ Universitat de Barcelona, ICCUB, IEEC-UB, E-08028 Barcelona, Spain
⁶ Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía-CSIC, Glorieta de la Astronomía s/n, 18008 Granada, Spain
⁷ National Institute for Astrophysics (INAF), I-00136 Rome, Italy
⁸ Università di Udine and INFN Trieste, I-33100 Udine, Italy
⁹ Max-Planck-Institut für Physik, D-85748 Garching, Germany
¹⁰ Università di Padova and INFN, I-35131 Padova, Italy
¹¹ Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias and Dpto. de Astrofísica, Universidad de La Laguna, E-38200 La Laguna, Tenerife, Spain
¹² Croatian MAGIC Group: University of Zagreb, Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing (FER), 10000 Zagreb, Croatia
¹³ Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, A CI of Homi Bhabha National Institute, Kolkata, 700064 West Bengal, India
¹⁴ Centro Brasileiro de Pesquisas Físicas (CBPF), 22290-180 URCA, Rio de Janeiro (RJ), Brazil
¹⁵ IPARCOS Institute and EMFTEL Department, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, E-28040 Madrid, Spain
¹⁶ University of Lodz, Faculty of Physics and Applied Informatics, Department of Astrophysics, 90-236 Lodz, Poland
¹⁷ Centro de Investigaciones Energéticas, Medioambientales y Tecnológicas, E-28040 Madrid, Spain
¹⁸ Departament de Física, and CERES-IEEC, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, E-08193 Bellaterra, Spain
¹⁹ Università di Pisa and INFN Pisa, I-56126 Pisa, Italy
²⁰ INFN MAGIC Group: INFN Sezione di Bari and Dipartimento Interateneo di Fisica dell’Università e del Politecnico di Bari, I-70125 Bari, Italy
²¹ Department for Physics and Technology, University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway
²² INFN MAGIC Group: INFN Sezione di Torino and Università degli Studi di Torino, I-10125 Torino, Italy
²³ Croatian MAGIC Group: University of Rijeka, Faculty of Physics, 51000 Rijeka, Croatia
²⁴ Universität Würzburg, D-97074 Würzburg, Germany
²⁵ Technische Universität Dortmund, D-44221 Dortmund, Germany
²⁶ Japanese MAGIC Group: Physics Program, Graduate School of Advanced Science and Engineering, Hiroshima University, 739-8526 Hiroshima, Japan
²⁷ Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron (DESY), D-15738 Zeuthen, Germany
²⁸ Armenian MAGIC Group: ICRANet-Armenia, 0019 Yerevan, Armenia
²⁹ Croatian MAGIC Group: University of Split, Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering and Naval Architecture (FESB), 21000 Split, Croatia
³⁰ Croatian MAGIC Group: Josip Juraj Strossmayer University of Osijek, Department of Physics, 31000 Osijek, Croatia
³¹ Finnish MAGIC Group: Finnish Centre for Astronomy with ESO, Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Turku, FI-20014 Turku, Finland
³² Japanese MAGIC Group: Department of Physics, Tokai University, Hiratsuka, 259-1292 Kanagawa, Japan
³³ University of Geneva, Chemin d’Ecogia 16, CH-1290 Versoix, Switzerland
³⁴ Inst. for Nucl. Research and Nucl. Energy, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, BG-1784 Sofia, Bulgaria
³⁵ INFN MAGIC Group: INFN Sezione di Catania and Dipartimento di Fisica e Astronomia, University of Catania, I-95123 Catania, Italy
³⁶ Japanese MAGIC Group: Department of Physics, Yamagata University, Yamagata 990-8560, Japan
³⁷ Finnish MAGIC Group: Space Physics and Astronomy Research Unit, University of Oulu, FI-90014 Oulu, Finland
³⁸ Japanese MAGIC Group: Chiba University, ICEHAP, 263-8522 Chiba, Japan
³⁹ Japanese MAGIC Group: Institute for Space-Earth Environmental Research and Kobayashi-Maskawa Institute for the Origin of Particles and the Universe, Nagoya University, 464-6801 Nagoya, Japan
⁴⁰ Japanese MAGIC Group: Department of Physics, Kyoto University, 606-8502 Kyoto, Japan
⁴¹ INFN MAGIC Group: INFN Roma Tor Vergata, I-00133 Roma, Italy
⁴² Japanese MAGIC Group: Department of Physics, Konan University, Kobe, Hyogo 658-8501, Japan
⁴³ also at International Center for Relativistic Astrophysics (ICRA), Rome, Italy
⁴⁴ also at Como Lake centre for AstroPhysics (CLAP), DiSAT, Università dell’Insubria, via Valleggio 11, 22100 Como, Italy
⁴⁵ also at Port d’Informació Científica (PIC), E-08193 Bellaterra (Barcelona), Spain
⁴⁶ now at Université Paris Cité, CNRS, Astroparticule et Cosmologie, F-75013 Paris, France
⁴⁷ also at Dipartimento di Fisica, Università di Trieste, I-34127 Trieste, Italy
⁴⁸ Max-Planck-Institut für Physik, D-85748 Garching, Germany
⁴⁹ also at INAF Padova, Padova, Italy
⁵⁰ Japanese MAGIC Group: Institute for Cosmic Ray Research (ICRR), The University of Tokyo, Kashiwa, 277-8582 Chiba, Japan

^⋆ Corresponding authors: contact.magic@mpp.mpg.de

Received: 9 May 2025
Accepted: 27 June 2025

Abstract

Gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are the most powerful transient objects in the Universe, and they are a primary target for the MAGIC Collaboration. Recognizing the challenges of observing these elusive objects with Imaging Atmospheric Cherenkov Telescopes (IACTs), we implemented a dedicated observational strategy that included an automated procedure for rapid re-pointing to transient sources. Since 2013, this automated procedure has enabled MAGIC to observe GRBs at a rate of approximately ten per year, which led to the successful detection of two GRBs at very high energies (VHE; E > 100 GeV). We present a comprehensive analysis of 42 non-detected GRBs (4 short GRBs) observed by MAGIC from 2013 to 2019. We derived upper limits (ULs) on the observed energy flux as well as on the intrinsic energy flux corrected for absorption by the extragalactic background light (EBL) from the MAGIC observations in selected energy and time intervals. We conducted a comprehensive study of their properties to investigate the reasons for these non-detections, including the possible peculiar properties of TeV-detected GRBs. We find that strong EBL absorption significantly hinders TeV detection for the majority of GRBs in our sample. For a subset of 6 GRBs with redshift z < 2, we compared the UL on the intrinsic flux in the VHE domain with the simultaneous X-ray flux, which is observed to be at the same level in the current population of TeV-detected GRBs. Based on these inferred MAGIC ULs, we conclude that a VHE component with a luminosity comparable to the simultaneously observed X-ray luminosity cannot be ruled out for this sample.

Key words: radiation mechanisms: non-thermal / gamma-ray burst: general / gamma rays: general

Open Access article, published by EDP Sciences, under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

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