The GeV γ-Ray Emission from the Composite Supernova Remnant CTB 87

Abstract

We report the GeV γ -ray emission around the composite supernova remnant (SNR) CTB 87 with more than 16 yr of PASS 8 data recorded by the Fermi Large Area Telescope. Two separate point sources with different GeV spectra are identified in this region: one has a soft γ -ray spectrum, likely due to interactions between the SNR shock and molecular clouds, and another source with a hard GeV γ -ray spectrum aligns with the TeV spectrum of VER J2016+371, suggesting it as the GeV counterpart. Considering the observations of CTB 87 in the radio and X-ray bands, VER J2016+371 is proposed to originate from the pulsar wind nebula (PWN) associated with PSR J2016+3711. A leptonic model with a broken power-law electron distribution could explain the multiwavelength data of VER J2016+371, with fitted parameters matching typical γ -ray PWNe. Deeper searching for the SNR shock of CTB 87 in other bands and the future TeV observations by LHAASO and Cherenkov Telescope Array are crucial to reveal the nature of CTB 87.

Keywords

• Supernova remnants
• Gamma-ray sources
• Pulsar wind nebulae