2025ApJ...981L..36K

The origin of PeV cosmic rays (CRs) is a long-standing mystery, and ultrahigh-energy gamma-ray observations would play a crucial role in identifying it. Recently, LHAASO reported the discovery of “dark” gamma-ray sources that were detected above 100 TeV without any GeV-TeV gamma-ray counterparts. The origins of these dark gamma-ray sources are unknown. We propose isolated black holes (IBHs) wandering in molecular clouds as the origins of PeV CRs and LHAASO dark sources. An IBH accretes surrounding dense gas, which forms a magnetically arrested disk (MAD) around the IBH. Magnetic reconnection in the MAD can accelerate CR protons up to PeV energies. CR protons of GeV-TeV energies fall to the IBH, whereas CR protons at sub-PeV energies can escape from the MAD, providing PeV CRs into the interstellar medium. The sub-PeV CR protons interact with the surrounding molecular clouds, producing TeV-PeV gamma rays without emitting GeV-TeV gamma rays. This scenario can explain the dark sources detected by LHAASO. Taking into account the IBH and molecular cloud distributions in our Galaxy, we demonstrate that IBHs can provide a significant contribution to the PeV CRs observed on Earth. Future gamma-ray detectors in the southern sky and neutrino detectors would provide a concrete test to our scenario.