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This volume consists of invited lectures and seminars presented at the NATO Advanced Study Institute "The Gamma Ray Sky with COMPTON GRO and SIGMA" , which was held at the Centre de Physique Theorique of Les Houches (France) in January / February 1994. The school has been planned by a Scientific Organizing Committee. It was organized with the aim of providing students and young researchers with an up-to-date account of the high-energy phenomena in the vicinity of compact objets and the diffuse gamma-ray backgrounds after the early results from the gamma-ray telescope SIGMA and the four instruments onboard COMPTON GRO (Gamma Ray Observatory) : BATSE (Burst and Transient Source Experiment),COMPTEL(Compto'l Telescope),EGRET (Energetic Gamma Ray Experiment Telescope) and OS SE(Oriented Scintillation Spectrometer Experiment) . It was attended by more than sixty researchers from many countries. The lectures and seminars represent a complete coverage of our present knowledge and understanding of: Gamma-ray backgrounds, Gamma-ray Burts,Active Galactic Nuclei,Galactic Compact Objects, Gamma-ray Spectroscopy, Instrumentation and observation techniques, etc ... Most of these lectures are reproduced in this volume. Unfortunately, a few lecturers have chosen not to submit their manuscript.
List of contents
I. Introductory Lecturers.- . The COMPTON Gamma Ray Observatory: Highlights from the First Three Years of the Mission.- . Overview of the SIGMA Results.- . TEV Gamma Ray Astronomy, Techniques.- II. Extragalactic Gamma-Ray Sources.- . High-Energy Radiation from Active Galactic Nuclei: Implications for AGN Unification Scenarios.- . Modelling the High Energy Spectra of AGN.- . Multi-wavelength Observations of Active Galactic Nuclei.- . OSSE Observations of Galactic Nuclei.- . EGRET Observations of Active Galactic Nuclei.- . TEV Gamma-Ray Astronomy, Extragalactic Sources.- III. Gamma - Ray Backgrounds.- . Diffuse Gamma Rays from WIMP Decay and Annihilation.- . The Diffuse ? Ray from Cosmic Ray Interactions in the Galaxy.- . Diffuse Galactic Continuum Emission.- . EGRET Observations of the Diffuse Galactic and Extragalactic Gamma-Ray Backgrounds.- IV. Galactic Gamma-Ray Sources.- . The Equation of State of Dense Matter.- . Binary Pulsar Shock Emission as Galactic Gamma-Ray Sources.- . TEV Gamma-Ray Astronomy, Galactic Sources.- . EGRET Observations of Galactic Gamma-Ray Sources.- . BATSE Observations of Galactic Black Hole Canditates.- . Observations of Discrete Galactic Sources with OSSE.- V. The Galactic Center.- . SIGMA Observations of the Galactic Center in the Hard X-Ray and Soft ? Ray Regime.- . Balloon Observations of the Galactic Center 511keV line and their Relationship to Satellite Results.- VI. Gamma - Ray Spectroscopy.- . Gamma-Ray Producing Radioactivities from Supernova Explosions.- . Astrophysical Gamma-Ray Lines from Accelerated Particle Interactions.- . Gamma-Ray Line Observations with the COMPTEL Imaging Telescope.- . Gamma-Ray Line Observational Results from OSSE.- VII. Gamma-Ray Bursts.- . Gamma-Ray Bursts: Theoretical Considerations.- . Statistics ofthe Gamma-Ray Burst Population.- . Observations of Gamma-Ray Bursts.- . Inquisitive Correlations in the BATSE Gamma-Ray Burst Data.- . Gamma Ray Bursts, Inverse Compton Scaterring and the precessing jets in galactic halo.- VIII Conclusion.- Summary.- Author Index.
