The Neutrino Luminosity of NGC 1068 and Its Share of the Accretion Power Budget
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: NGC 1068, a nearby Seyfert galaxy, hosts the most significant individual neutrino point source identified to date. Converting its reported muon-neutrino flux into a luminosity tests whether neutrino production is a major or minor channel of the accretion power. Integrating the best-fit spectrum, with index 3.2 and normalisation 5.000e-11 per TeV per square centimetre per second at 1 TeV, over 1 to 100 TeV at a distance of 14.4 Mpc gives a muon-neutrino luminosity of 1.650e+42 erg per second and an all-flavour luminosity of 4.949e+42 erg per second. That is 0.247 per cent of a representative bolometric luminosity of 2 x 10^45 erg per second and 0.262 per cent of the Eddington luminosity for a 1.5 x 10^7 solar-mass black hole. At a representative neutrino production efficiency of five per cent, the required proton power is 9.898e+43 erg per second, about five per cent of the bolometric output — demanding but not excessive. Neutrino production in NGC 1068 is energetically a side channel, not the engine. The study is computed from stated assumptions, not measured.
Author: Aldred, William Alexander
Language: English
Subfield: Nuclear and High Energy Physics
Field: Physics and Astronomy
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7225796062
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