VERY-HIGH-ENERGY GAMMA-RAYS FROM PSR 1706-44

We have obtained evidence of gamma-ray emmission above 1 TeV from PSR 1706-44, using a ground-based telescope of the atmospheric Cerenkov im aging type located near Woomera, South Australia. This object, a gamma -ray source discovered by the COS B satellite (2CG 342-02), was identi fied with the radio pulsar through the discovery of a 102 ms pulsed si gnal with the EGRET instrument of the Compton Gamma-Ray Observatory. T he flux of the present observation above a threshold of 1 TeV is appro ximately 1 x 10(-11) photons cm-2 s-1, which is two orders of magnitud e smaller than the extrapolation from GeV energies. The analysis is no t restricted to a search for emission modulated with the 102 ms period , and the reported flux is for all gamma-rays from PSR 1706-44, pulsed and unpulsed. The energy output in the TeV region corresponds to abou t 10(-3) of the spin-down energy-loss rate of the neutron star.