Paliya, Vaidehi S.Diltz, ChrisBöttcher, MarkusStalin, C.S.Buckley, David2017-04-132017-04-132016Paliya, V.S. et al. 2016. A hard gamma-ray flare from 3C 279 in 2013 December. Astrophysical journal, 817(1): Article no 61. [https://doi.org/10.3847/0004-637X/817/1/61]1538-4357 (Online)0004-637Xhttp://hdl.handle.net/10394/21390https://doi.org/10.3847/0004-637X/817/1/61http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/0004-637X/817/1/61/pdfThe blazar 3C 279 exhibited twin γ-ray flares of similar intensity in 2013 December and 2014 April. In this work, we present a detailed multi-wavelength analysis of the 2013 December flaring event. Multi-frequency observations reveal the uncorrelated variability patterns with X-ray and optical–UV fluxes peaking after the γ-ray maximum. The broadband spectral energy distribution (SED) at the peak of the γ-ray activity shows a rising γ-ray spectrum but a declining optical–UV flux. This observation along with the detection of uncorrelated variability behavior rules out the one-zone leptonic emission scenario. We, therefore, adopt two independent methodologies to explain the SED: a time-dependent lepto-hadronic modeling and a two-zone leptonic radiative modeling approach. In the lepto-hadronic modeling, a distribution of electrons and protons subjected to a randomly orientated magnetic field produces synchrotron radiation. Electron synchrotron is used to explain the IR to UV emission while proton synchrotron emission is used to explain the high-energy γ-ray emission. A combination of both electron synchrotron self-Compton emission and proton synchrotron emission is used to explain the X-ray spectral break seen during the later stage of the flare. In the two-zone modeling, we assume a large emission region emitting primarily in IR to X-rays and γ-rays to come primarily from a fast-moving compact emission region. We conclude by noting that within a span of four months, 3C 279 has shown the dominance of a variety of radiative processes over each other and this reflects the complexity involved in understanding the physical properties of blazar jets in generalenGalaxies: activeGalaxies: jetsGamma rays: galaxiesQuasars: individual (3C 279)Article