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Galactic cosmic rays reach energies of at least a few Peta-electronvolts (1 PeV =1015 electron volts)1 . This implies our Galaxy contains PeV accelerators (PeVatrons), but all proposed models of Galactic cosmic-ray accelerators encounter non-trivial difficulties at exactly these energies 2 . Tens of Galactic accelerators capable of accelerating particle to tens of TeV (1 TeV =10 12 electron volts) energies were inferred from recent gamma-ray observations 3 . None of the currently known accelerators, however, not even the handful of shell-type supernova remnants commonly believed to supply most Galactic cosmic rays, have shown the characteristic tracers of PeV particles: power-law spectra of gamma rays extending without a cutoff or a spectral break to tens of TeV 4 . Here we report deep gamma-ray observations with arcminute angular resolution of the Galactic Centre regions, which show the expected tracer of the presence of PeV particles within the central 10 parsec of the Galaxy. We argue that the supermassive black hole Sagittarius A* is linked to this PeVatron. Sagittarius A* went through active phases in the past, as demonstrated by X-ray outbursts 5 and an outflow from the Galactic Center 6 . Although its current rate of particle acceleration is not sufficient to provide a substantial contribution to Galactic cosmic rays, Sagittarius A* could have plausibly been more active over the last 10 6−7 years, and therefore should be considered as a viable alternative to supernova remnants as a source of PeV Galactic cosmic rays.The large photon statistics accumulated over the last 10 years of observations with the High Energy Stereoscopic System (H.E.S.S.), together with improvements in the methods of data analysis, allow for a deep study of the properties of the diffuse very-high-energy (VHE; more than 100 GeV) emission of the central molecular zone. This region surrounding the Galactic Centre contains predominantly molecular gas and extends (in projection) out to r∼250 pc at positive galactic longitudes and r∼150 pc at negative longitudes. The map of the central molecular zone as seen in VHE γ-rays (Fig. 1) shows a strong (although not linear; see below) correlation between the brightness distribution of VHE γ-rays and the locations of massive gas-rich complexes. This points towards a hadronic origin of the diffuse emission 7 , where the γ-rays result from the interactions of relativistic protons with the ambient gas. The second important mechanism of production of VHE γ-rays 3 is the inverse Compton scattering of electrons. However, the severe radiative losses suffered by multi-TeV electrons in the Galactic Centre region prevent them from propagating over scales comparable to the size of the central molecular zone, thus disfavouring a leptonic origin of the γ-rays (see discussion in Methods and Extended Data Figures 1 and 2). The location and the particle injection rate history of the cosmic-ray accelerator(s), responsible for the relativistic protons, determine the spatial distribution of these cosmic rays which...

We present the results of the most comprehensive survey of the Galactic plane in very high-energy (VHE) γ-rays, including a public release of Galactic sky maps, a catalog of VHE sources, and the discovery of 16 new sources of VHE γ-rays. The High Energy Spectroscopic System (H.E.S.S.) Galactic plane survey (HGPS) was a decade-long observation program carried out by the H.E.S.S. I array of Cherenkov telescopes in Namibia from 2004 to 2013. The observations amount to nearly 2700 h of quality-selected data, covering the Galactic plane at longitudes from ℓ = 250° to 65° and latitudes |b|≤ 3°. In addition to the unprecedented spatial coverage, the HGPS also features a relatively high angular resolution (0.08° ≈ 5 arcmin mean point spread function 68% containment radius), sensitivity (≲1.5% Crab flux for point-like sources), and energy range (0.2–100 TeV). We constructed a catalog of VHE γ-ray sources from the HGPS data set with a systematic procedure for both source detection and characterization of morphology and spectrum. We present this likelihood-based method in detail, including the introduction of a model component to account for unresolved, large-scale emission along the Galactic plane. In total, the resulting HGPS catalog contains 78 VHE sources, of which 14 are not reanalyzed here, for example, due to their complex morphology, namely shell-like sources and the Galactic center region. Where possible, we provide a firm identification of the VHE source or plausible associations with sources in other astronomical catalogs. We also studied the characteristics of the VHE sources with source parameter distributions. 16 new sources were previously unknown or unpublished, and we individually discuss their identifications or possible associations. We firmly identified 31 sources as pulsar wind nebulae (PWNe), supernova remnants (SNRs), composite SNRs, or gamma-ray binaries. Among the 47 sources not yet identified, most of them (36) have possible associations with cataloged objects, notably PWNe and energetic pulsars that could power VHE PWNe.

Spectral lines are among the most powerful signatures for dark matter (DM) annihilation searches in very-high-energy γ rays. The central region of the Milky Way halo is one of the most promising targets given its large amount of DM and proximity to Earth. We report on a search for a monoenergetic spectral line from self-annihilations of DM particles in the energy range from 300 GeV to 70 TeV using a twodimensional maximum likelihood method taking advantage of both the spectral and spatial features of the signal versus background. The analysis makes use of Galactic center observations accumulated over ten years (2004)(2005)(2006)(2007)(2008)(2009)(2010)(2011)(2012)(2013)(2014) with the H.E.S.S. array of ground-based Cherenkov telescopes. No significant γ-ray excess above the background is found. We derive upper limits on the annihilation cross section hσvi for monoenergetic DM lines at the level of 4 × 10 −28 cm 3 s −1 at 1 TeV, assuming an Einasto DM profile for the Milky Way halo. For a DM mass of 1 TeV, they improve over the previous ones by a factor of 6. The present constraints are the strongest obtained so far for DM particles in the mass range 300 GeV-70 TeV. Groundbased γ-ray observations have reached sufficient sensitivity to explore relevant velocity-averaged cross sections for DM annihilation into two γ-ray photons at the level expected from the thermal relic density for TeV DM particles.

The nine-year H.E.S.S. Galactic Plane Survey (HGPS) has yielded the most uniform observation scan of the inner Milky Way in the TeV gamma-ray band to date. The sky maps and source catalogue of the HGPS allow for a systematic study of the population of TeV pulsar wind nebulae found throughout the last decade. To investigate the nature and evolution of pulsar wind nebulae, for the first time we also present several upper limits for regions around pulsars without a detected TeV wind nebula. Our data exhibit a correlation of TeV surface brightness with pulsar spin-down powerĖ. This seems to be caused both by an increase of extension with decreasingĖ, and hence with time, compatible with a power law RPWN(Ė) ∼Ė −0.65±0.20 , and by a mild decrease of TeV gamma-ray luminosity with decreasingĖ, compatible with L1−10 TeV ∼Ė 0.59±0.21 . We also find that the offsets of pulsars with respect to the wind nebula centre with ages around 10 kyr are frequently larger than can be plausibly explained by pulsar proper motion and could be due to an asymmetric environment. In the present data, it seems that a large pulsar offset is correlated with a high apparent TeV efficiency L1−10 TeV /Ė. In addition to 14 HGPS sources considered firmly identified pulsar wind nebulae and 5 additional pulsar wind nebulae taken from literature, we find 10 HGPS sources that are likely TeV pulsar wind nebula candidates. Using a model that subsumes the present common understanding of the very high-energy radiative evolution of pulsar wind nebulae, we find that the trends and variations of the TeV observables and limits can be reproduced to a good level, drawing a consistent picture of present-day TeV data and theory.