The impact of networks of robotic telescopes in continuous monitoring of high energy cosmic sources

Franco Giovannelli1*, and Lola Sabau-Graziati2
1INAF - Istituto di Astrofisica Spaziale e Fisica Cosmica, Roma Area di Ricerca di Roma-2, Via del Fosso del Cavaliere 100, I 00133 Roma, Italy
2INTA - Dpt de Programas Espaciales y Ciencias del Espacio Ctra de Ajalvir Km 4 - E 28850 Torrejón de Ardóz, Spain

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Abstract

High energy (HE) cosmic sources are characterized by emissions in a wide range of the electromagnetic spectrum. In order to clarify their behavior and understand the involved physics it is necessary to perform simultaneous measurements in a range of energy as wide as possible. This makes it necessary to use different techniques and instrumentation both space- and ground-based. Simultaneous observations are in general very diffcult to be performed because they need the involvement of many instruments that belong to many experiments under the control of many groups and countries. However, since the importance of multifrequency measurements is now universally recognized, many efforts are made in order to obtain such measurements. Our group has been a pioneer in such a kind of measurements since middle of 1970s. We will briefly discuss the impact of such measurements in different class of HE cosmic sources, such as T Tauri stars (TTSs), active galactic nuclei (AGNs), gamma-ray bursts (GRBs), X-ray binary systems (XRBs), and cataclysmic variables (CVs). This discussion is mainly based on the review paper "The impact of the space experiments on our knowledge of the physics of the universe" (Giovannelli & Sabau-Graziati 2004) and subsequent revisions. We will also discuss the importance of having a network of robotic telescopes that can provide long term optical monitoring of the classes of HE sources already discussed. Such measurements will provide fundamental data for understanding many problems that are still open, such as the physics of the outbursts in flaring systems, the search of rotational periods of white dwarfs in CVs and orbital periods of those systems, rotational periods and periodicities of flare-like events of TTSs, correlations between optical and X-ray flares in X-ray/Be systems, fluctuations in the light curves of AGNs and their correlations with the HE emission in order to test the validity of current models, etc.



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Keywords : cataclysmic variables - X-ray pulsars - T Tauri stars - AGNs - jets - gamma-ray bursts - multifrequency observations - robotic campaigns.