Open-Source Radiative Modeling Tools for Extragalactic VHE Gamma-ray Sources
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Dear authors,
I completed the peer review of "Open-source Radiative Modelling Tools for Extragalactic VHE gamma-ray Sources".
The paper discuss the software tools available for emission modeling in a very clear but yet detailed way. Personally I knew only some of them and now I want to explore the others indicated here.
I really appreciate the idea to have a benchmark set to help in the validation of these or other similar tools.
Really a nice Job!
Author Response
We are grateful to the referee for the positive review. Following the request of one of the referees we tried to make the text more readable. Beside some language corrections, the content remains unchanged with respect to the previous version. All changes are marked in boldface.
Reviewer 2 Report
I recommend accepting the publication of the manuscript.
Author Response
We are grateful to the referee for the positive review. Following the request of one of the referees we tried to make the text more readable. Beside some language corrections, the content remains unchanged with respect to the previous version. All changes are marked in boldface.
Reviewer 3 Report
A brief discussion of the open-source software for the modeling of the broad-band emissions from astrophysical objects is presented. The physical processes and emitting region geometry implemented by the considered software as well as their repositories and possible combinations of the software packages are listed.
Six packages (nima, GAMERA, JetSeT, agnpy, BBJet, FLAREMODEL) are briefly examined in the fitting of the emission from radio to gamma-rays from the jetted extragalactic sources like AGNi and GRBs.
The presented manuscript of the open-source software gives a useful overview of the available tools for the interpretation of the multi-wavelength experimental astrophysical data and deserves publication.
But the following points in the manuscript require clarification and should be added before publication.
1. Something is missing in the title of subsection 4.2. Please, fix it.
2. Please, specify the models and approximations which are used in the overviewed packages to implement the radiative scenarios?
What are the limitations of the application of these models and their ranges of usage?
3. Is the choice from the model list supposed to exist in the case of the GAMERA, JetSeT? Please, specify it in the text.
4. What kind of numerical models to fit the data are available in the case of the JetSet? What models of gamma-gamma absorption on the EBL are applied in this package?
Author Response
Reviewer 3
A brief discussion of the open-source software for the modelling of the broad-band emissions from astrophysical objects is presented. The physical processes and emitting region geometry implemented by the considered software as well as their repositories and possible combinations of the software packages are listed.
Six packages (nima, GAMERA, JetSeT, agnpy, BBJet, FLAREMODEL) are briefly examined in the fitting of the emission from radio to gamma-rays from the jetted extragalactic sources like AGNi and GRBs.
The presented manuscript of the open-source software gives a useful overview of the available tools for the interpretation of the multi-wavelength experimental astrophysical data and deserves publication.
But the following points in the manuscript require clarification and should be added before publication.
- Something is missing in the title of subsection 4.2. Please, fix it.
AUTHORS: fixed.
- Please, specify the models and approximations which are used in the overviewed packages to implement the radiative scenarios?
AUTHORS: We agree with the referee that a detailed description of the radiative processes assumptions and numerical implementations would provide a useful piece of information. Anyhow, adding these details would not only duplicate what is already described in the referenced publications and/or online documentation, but also make the text of the review considerably longer. For this reason, we have decided to give, for each package, a brief overview of the implemented radiative scenarios, without a detailed description of the numerical implementation.
What are the limitations of the application of these models and their ranges of usage?
AUTHORS: We have described in the text a showcase of possible scenarios, for each package. It is difficult to define a clear boundary to the usage range, since most of the packages have a plugin-oriented implementation, which clearly widens the usage.
- Is the choice from the model list supposed to exist in the case of the GAMERA, JetSeT? Please, specify it in the text.
AUTHORS: It is not clear to us which is the model list the referee is referring to; or why this list of models regards only gamera and jetset.
- What kind of numerical models to fit the data are available in the case of the JetSet? What models of gamma-gamma absorption on the EBL are applied in this package?
AUTHORS: We have specified in the text which numerical models can be used for fitting in jetset. We have also listed the EBL models available in the packages.
Reviewer 4 Report
My review is attached.
Comments for author File: 
Comments.pdf
Author Response
We are a bit surprised by the strong comment of the reviewer about the language, as we received no complaints about it from the other three reviewers. We apologise to the reviewer if our writing had such a bad quality as to make the reading painful. We agree that the language of some sections can be improved. Not having access to professional editing services, we tried - to the best of our capabilities - to revise the language of the whole manuscript. We hope that the current version will be considered acceptable. All changes are marked in boldface. We would like to point out that the plural of "software" is "software" as well https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/software as it is uncountable, and that "desiderata" is the latin plural of "desideratum" https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/desideratum.
Round 2
Reviewer 3 Report
The authors revised the manuscript by adding the references to the EBL models and specifying the numerical models used for fitting in JetSet. Also, clarifications about the description of the approximations and models implementing the radiative scenarios in the overviewed packages are provided.
The article can be finally published after the clarifying the issue about the limitation of the model applications.
It would be useful to know the application boundaries and ranges of the models used in described packages, so the appropriate references should be given in the text.
Author Response
It is not clear to us what the referee means by “application boundaries and ranges of the models used in described packages”.
If the referee means which type of sources can and cannot be modelled by the packages, we think we already addressed the question by illustrating, for each of the packages, its applications and citing the actual reference making use of the particular software. Furthermore the first column of Table 1 explicitly mentions the type of sources that the different packages can model. In the hope of being even more clear, we added a paragraph in Section 4.1 (marked in boldface and starting on line 446 of the latest version) making an overview and explicitly stating which sources can and cannot be modelled with the software presented in the review.
If the referee means the range of parameters / physical quantities for which it is reasonable to apply the models described, we think this question has no answer. The range of “reasonable value” for a given parameter is estimated from previous modelling (e.g. leptonic models use magnetic fields well below 1 G), from other measurement (e.g. one can infer from radio measurements the velocity of a plasmoid and its bulk Lorentz factor), or from physical consideration (it would be absurd to consider electrons with Lorentz factors 10^(10)). But making an overall estimation of the reasonable parameter space it’s a very hard - and maybe impossible - task. Additionally every radiative process considered brings new parameters, increasing the parameter space.
We thank the referee for this additional iteration and hope that we have clarified the range of usage of the models with the newly added paragraph.
Reviewer 4 Report
I recommend acceptance for this revised version.My critiques were honest and for genuine wish to improve upon the presentation.
Best wishes for the authors.
Author Response
We are grateful to the referee for motivating us to improve the quality of the writing.
