External Compton Scattering in Blazar Jets and the Location of the Gamma-Ray Emitting Region

Understand

I study the location of the $\gamma$-ray emission in blazar jets by creating a Compton-scattering approximation valid for all anisotropic radiation fields in the Thomson through Klein-Nishina regimes, which is highly accurate and can speed up numerical calculations by up to a factor $\sim10$.

• I apply this approximation to synchrotron self-Compton, and external Compton-scattering of photons from the accretion disk, broad-line region (BLR), and dust torus.
• I use a stratified BLR model and include detailed Compton-scattering calculations of a spherical and flattened BLR.
• I create two dust torus models, one where the torus is an annulus, and one where it is an extended disk.