The American Astronomical Society (AAS) awards the 2012 Bruno Rossi prize to Marco Tavani and the AGILE Team for the discovery of transient gamma-ray emission from the Crab Nebula

The 2012 Rossi Prize has been awarded to astrophysicist Marco Tavani and the AGILE team for the discovery of variable gamma-ray emission from the Crab Nebula. Believed to be a steady source of energy - from optical to gamma rays - this finding has changed our understanding of cosmic accelerators.
"The production of these incredible gamma-ray flares from the Crab Nebula is a feat that will lead us to a deeper understanding of the fundamental processes of particle acceleration in cosmic sources," said Dr. Tavani. "AGILE unveiled this phenomenon in part because of its rapid data acquisition and processing - a large success for a 'Small Mission'."
The AAS High Energy Astrophysics Division (HEAD) awards the Rossi Prize in recognition of significant contributions as well as recent and original work in high-energy astrophysics. The prize is in honor of Professor Bruno Rossi, an authority on cosmic-ray physics and a pioneer in the field of X-ray astronomy.
Dr. Tavani will give a lecture at the 221st AAS meeting in Long Beach, California, in January 2013.

See also INAF news, ASI news, INFN news, ASDC news

Interview with Marco Tavani, AGILE Principal Investigator, and Giovanni Bignami, President of the Italian Institute for Astrophysics (INAF)

SuperAGILE detects a Gamma-Ray Burst associated with a Supernova

On December 11, 2011 at 22:17:33 UT the SuperAGILE hard X-ray monitor aboard the Italian AGILE satellite localized a Gamma Ray Burst, GRB 111211A (GCN #12666 F. Lazzarotto et al.). The GRB 111211A is the first event detected by SuperAGILE associated with a Supernova (GCN #12802 A. de Ugarte Postigo et al.).While an average number of about 200 - 300 GRBs are localised each year in the X-ray band, less than twenty firm associations with Supernovae are established up to now. The SuperAGILE GRB 111211A is a rare occurrence of a burst which appears to be accompanied by a Supernova explosion, and gives the opportunity to further investigate the GRB-Supernova connection.
See also INAF news, ASDC news

AGILE resolves the mystery of the origin of cosmic rays

AGILE has discovered a pattern of gamma-ray emission from the Supernova Remnant W44 that can be unambiguosly attributed to accelerate protons smashing against surrounding gas. For many decades, a direct identification of sites in our galaxy where proton acceleration takes place has been elusive. The AGILE data resolves the problem of clearly identifying a source of energetic cosmic rays in our galaxy. The AGILE team reported these findings in the paper by Giuliani et al., ApJL, 742, L30, 2011.
See also INAF news, ASI news, Italian Press Release, English Press Release

AGILE Cycle-3 Public Data now available

The proprietary period for the AGILE Cycle-3 Observation Blocks (OB) from OB 8600 to OB 10400 has currently expired. The data are public and available from the ASDC Multimission Archive (MMIA) webpage for the AGILE Mission.

New Crab Nebula super-flare on April 16, 2011

A very strong gamma-ray flare was detected by AGILE on April 16, 2011 from the Crab Nebula. The flux above 100 MeV reached the unprecedented value of
F = (2000 +/- 370) 10^{-8} ph/cm^2/sec.
The Crab was then twice as bright as the Vela Pulsar!

See ATel # 3286

AGILE's 20.000 orbits

On March 10, 2011 AGILE reached an important goal, it orbited the Earth 20.000 times since it was launched from the Sriharikota Indian base on April 23, 2007.

See
ASI News           Media INAF

AGILE discovery that the Crab Nebula is variable

The Crab Nebula is certainly one of the most famous astronomical objects. It is at the center of a bright supernova that exploded in 1054 and was recorded by Chinese astronomers. It encloses now at its very center one of the most powerful pulsars. The Crab has been considered for decades as one of the strongest persistent X-ray and gamma-ray source in the sky and was then used as a standard calibration source in astrophysics. Therefore, when between Sept. 19 and Sept.21, 2010 the AGILE team detected a strongly enhanced gamma-ray emission from the Crab Nebula region (ATel # 2855) it provoked a sort of shock in the community. Following the AGILE discovery and the confirmation by Fermi/LAT on the following day (Atel #2861), many telescopes (Swift, INTEGRAL, Hubble, Chandra) have then pointed and are still pointing at the Crab, gathering precious information for precisely identifying the phenomenon.
See also INAF news, ASI news, ASDC news

Timetable of the Astronomer’s Telegram releases on the Crab Nebula flare in universal time, within 1 month after discovery on 22 September 2010. Corresponding telegram IDs are: 2855, 2856, 2858, 2861, 2866, 2867, 2868, 2872, 2879, 2882, 2889, 2893, 2903, 2921, 2967, 2968.

Agile article on the Crab Nebula
reporting the surprising gamma-ray flares,
published on Jan. 6, 2011 on Science Express

See also the official ASI-INAF-INFN press release
Italian version           English version

Prof. M. Tavani's presentation for the Press Conference "Not-So-Standard Candle"
at the 217th AAS Meeting, Seattle, January 12, 2011

Ron Cowen reports on ScienceNews about the variability
of the Crab Nebula at the 2010 Texas Symposium, in Heidelberg

The Newton magazine reports about the discovery by AGILE
of the variability of the Crab Nebula

AGILE discovery of surprising gamma-ray emission up to 100 MeV from Terrestrial Gamma-Ray Flashes (TGFs)

AGILE latest article on Terrestrial Gamma-Ray Flashes (TGFs)
reporting the surprising discovery of gamma-ray radiation
up to 100 MeV, published on Jan. 3, 2011 by Phys. Rev. Letters

Commentary by J. Dwyer on Physics (Jan. 3, 2011)
See Chance of thunder and gamma-ray flashes

See also Thunder storm radiation amazes physicists