Locating γ-ray sources on the celestial sphere via modal clustering

Searching for as yet undetected γ-ray sources is a major target of the Fermi LAT Collaboration. In this paper, we present an algorithm capable to identify such type of sources by non-parametrically clustering the directions of arrival of the high-energy photons detected by the telescope. Using statistical tools from hypothesis testing and classification, we furthermore present an automatic way to skim off sound candidate sources from the γ-ray emitting diffuse background and to quantify their significance. The algorithm was calibrated on simulated data provided by the Fermi LAT collaboration and will be illustrated on a real Fermi LAT case-study.