A $γ$-ray Quasi-Periodic modulation in the Blazar PKS 0301$-$243?

Abstract

We report a nominally high-confidence $γ$-ray quasi-periodic modulation in the blazar PKS 0301$-$243. For this target, we analyze its \emph{Fermi}-LAT Pass 8 data covering from 2008 August to 2017 May. Two techniques, i.e., the maximum likelihood optimization and the exposure-weighted aperture photometry, are used to build the $γ$-ray light curves. Then both the Lomb-Scargle Periodogram and the Weighted Wavelet Z-transform are applied to the light curves to search for period signals. A quasi-periodicity with a period of $2.1\pm0.3$ yr appears at the significance level of $\sim5σ$, although it should be noted that this putative quasi-period variability is seen in a data set barely four times longer. We speculate that this $γ$-ray quasi-periodic modulation might be evidence of a binary supermassive black hole.

9 pages, 8 figures; Accepted for publication in ApJ