Jet Formation from Rotating Magnetized Objects

Jet formation is connected most probably with matter acceleration from the vicinity of rotating magnetized bodies. It is usually related to the mass outflows and ejection from accretion disks around black holes. Problem of jet collimation is discussed. Collapse of a rotating magnetized body during star formation or supernovae explosion may lead to a jet-like mass ejection for certain angular velocity and magnetic field distributions at the beginning of the collapse. Jet formation during magnetorotational explosion is discussed basing on the numerical simulation of collapse of magnetized bodied with quasi-dipole field.Comment: Will be published in the proc. of 20th Texas Symposium, Austin, Texas 7 pages, 7 picture

The Core-Collapse Supernova with "Non-Uniform" Magnetic Fields

We perform two-dimensional numerical simulations on the core-collapse of a massive star with strong magnetic fields and differential rotations using a numerical code ZEUS-2D. Changing field configurations and laws of differential rotation parametrically, we compute 14 models and investigate effects of these parameters on the dynamics. In our models, we do not solve the neutrino transport and instead employ a phenomenological parametric EOS that takes into account the neutrino emissions. As a result of the calculations, we find that the field configuration plays a significant role in the dynamics of the core if the initial magnetic field is large enough. Models with initially concentrated fields produce more energetic explosions and more prolate shock waves than the uniform field. Quadrapole-like fields produce remarkably collimated and fast jet, which might be important for gamma-ray bursts(GRB). The Lorentz forces exerted in the region where the plasma-beta is less than unity are responsible for these dynamics. The pure toroidal field, on the other hand, does not lead to any explosion or matter ejection. This suggests the presupernova models of Heger et al.(2003), in which toroidal fields are predominant, is disadvantageous for the magnetorotation-induced supernova considered here. Models with initially weak magnetic fields do not lead to explosion or matter ejection, either. In these models magnetic fields play no role as they do not grow on the timescale considered in this paper so that the magnetic pressure could be comparable to the matter pressure. This is because the exponential field growth as expected in MRI is not seen in our models. The magnetic field is amplified mainly by field-compression and field-wrapping in our simulations.Comment: 24 pages, 5 figures, ApJ in press, typos correcte

A Two-Dimensional MagnetoHydrodynamics Scheme for General Unstructured Grids

We report a new finite-difference scheme for two-dimensional magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) simulations, with and without rotation, in unstructured grids with quadrilateral cells. The new scheme is implemented within the code VULCAN/2D, which already includes radiation-hydrodynamics in various approximations and can be used with arbitrarily moving meshes (ALE). The MHD scheme, which consists of cell-centered magnetic field variables, preserves the nodal finite difference representation of div(\bB) by construction, and therefore any initially divergence-free field remains divergence-free through the simulation. In this paper, we describe the new scheme in detail and present comparisons of VULCAN/2D results with those of the code ZEUS/2D for several one-dimensional and two-dimensional test problems. The code now enables two-dimensional simulations of the collapse and explosion of the rotating, magnetic cores of massive stars. Moreover, it can be used to simulate the very wide variety of astrophysical problems for which multi-D radiation-magnetohydrodynamics (RMHD) is relevant.Comment: 22 pages, including 11 figures; Accepted to the Astrophysical Journal. Higher resolution figures available at http://zenith.as.arizona.edu/~burrows/mhd-code

Magnetorotational supernovae

We present the results of 2D simulations of the magnetorotational model of a supernova explosion. After the core collapse the core consists of rapidly a rotating proto-neutron star and a differentially rotating envelope. The toroidal part of the magnetic energy generated by the differential rotation grows linearly with time at the initial stage of the evolution of the magnetic field. The linear growth of the toroidal magnetic field is terminated by the development of magnetohydrodynamic instability, leading to drastic acceleration in the growth of magnetic energy. At the moment when the magnetic pressure becomes comparable with the gas pressure at the periphery of the proto-neutron star $\sim 10-15$km from the star centre the MHD compression wave appears and goes through the envelope of the collapsed iron core. It transforms soon to the fast MHD shock and produces a supernova explosion. Our simulations give the energy of the explosion $0.6\cdot 10^{51}$ ergs. The amount of the mass ejected by the explosion is $\sim 0.14M_\odot$. The implicit numerical method, based on the Lagrangian triangular grid of variable structure, was used for the simulations.Comment: Revised version. Submitted to the MNRA