Determine whether several-PeV electrons are required

Determine whether electrons extending to several petaelectronvolts are genuinely required to reproduce the broadband emission of the PSR B0540--69 pulsar wind nebula by obtaining deeper multi-TeV observations.

Background

The preferred effective two-zone spectral model yields an inner-zone electron cutoff of a few petaelectronvolts, suggesting that PSR B0540--69 may accelerate particles to very high energies. However, the result is model-dependent and the existing TeV constraints are limited to an upper limit. Deeper multi-TeV observations could determine whether such an extreme high-energy electron population is actually needed.

References

Deeper multi-TeV observations would constrain the high-energy electron population and IC intensity in the outer zone, thereby testing whether electrons extending to several PeV are genuinely required to account for the broadband emission.

— Flux Evolution of PSR B0540--69 and the Spectral Energy Distribution of its Pulsar Wind Nebula  (2610.13182 - Zhang et al., 9 Oct 2026) in Section 6, Conclusion and Discussion