1,682 research outputs found
Accretion Disk Evolution With Wind Infall I. General Solution and Application to Sgr A*
The evolution of an accretion disk can be influenced significantly by the
deposition of mass and angular momentum by an infalling Bondi-Hoyle wind. Such
a mass influx impacts the long-term behavior of the disk by providing
additional sources of viscosity and heating. In this paper, we derive and solve
the disk equations when these effects are taken into account. We present a
survey of models with various wind configurations and demonstrate that the disk
spectrum may then differ substantially from that of a standard alpha-disk. In
particular, it is likely that a wind-fed disk has a significant infrared bump
due to the deposition of energy in its outer region. We apply some of the
results of our calculations to the Galactic Center black hole candidate Sgr A*
and show that if a fossil disk is present in this source, it must have a very
low viscosity parameter (alpha<10^-4) and the Bondi-Hoyle wind must be
accreting with a very high specific angular momentum to prevent it from
circularizing in the inner disk region where its impact would be most
noticeable.Comment: accepted for The Astrophysical Journal, AAS LaTex, 20 pages, also
available at http://www.astro.umd.edu/~hfalcke/publications.html#wintercep
Monte Carlo simulations of air showers in atmospheric electric fields
The development of cosmic ray air showers can be influenced by atmospheric
electric fields. Under fair weather conditions these fields are small, but the
strong fields inside thunderstorms can have a significant effect on the
electromagnetic component of a shower. Understanding this effect is
particularly important for radio detection of air showers, since the radio
emission is produced by the shower electrons and positrons. We perform Monte
Carlo simulations to calculate the effects of different electric field
configurations on the shower development. We find that the electric field
becomes important for values of the order of 1 kV/cm. Not only can the energy
distribution of electrons and positrons change significantly for such field
strengths, it is also possible that runaway electron breakdown occurs at high
altitudes, which is an important effect in lightning initiation.Comment: 24 pages, 19 figures, accepted for publication in Astroparticle
Physic
Molecular Hydrogen and Paschen-alpha Emission in Cooling Flow Galaxies
We present near-infrared spectra obtained to search for Pa-alpha and
molecular hydrogen lines in edge-darkened (FR I-type) radio galaxies with
bright Halpha emission in the redshift range 0.0535<z<0.15. We find that all
three galaxies in our sample (PKS 0745-191, PKS 1346+26, & PKS2322-12) which
are associated with strong cooling flows also have strong Pa-alpha and H_2
(1-0) S(1) through S(5) emission, while other radio galaxies do not. Together
with earlier observations this confirms claims that cooling flow galaxies are
copious emitters of molecular hydrogen with large H_2 (1-0) S(3)/Pa-alpha
ratios in the range 0.5 to 2. The emission is centrally concentrated within the
inner few kiloparsec and could come from warm (T ~ 1000-1500 K) molecular
material which is being deposited by the cooling flow. We speculate that the
H_2 emission could be related to the interaction between the jets and this
molecular gas.Comment: ApJ Letters, in press, AAS LaTex, preprint also available at
http://www.astro.umd.edu/~hfalcke/publications.html#nirga
The Role of Magnetic Field Dissipation in the Black Hole Candidate Sgr A*
The compact, nonthermal radio source Sgr A* at the Galactic Center appears to
be coincident with a 2.6 million solar mass point-like object. Its energy
source may be the release of gravitational energy as gas from the interstellar
medium descends into its potential well. Simple attempts at calculating the
spectrum and flux based on this picture have come close to the observations,
yet have had difficulty in accounting for the low efficiency in this source.
There now appear to be two reasons for this low conversion rate: (1) the plasma
separates into two temperatures, with the protons attaining a significantly
higher temperature than that of the radiating electrons, and (2) the magnetic
field, B, is sub-equipartition, which reduces the magnetic bremsstrahlung
emissivity, and therefore the overall power of Sgr A*. We investigate the
latter with improvement over what has been attempted before: rather than
calculating B based on a presumed model, we instead infer its distribution with
radius empirically with the requirement that the resulting spectrum matches the
observations. Our ansatz for B(r) is motivated in part by earlier calculations
of the expected magnetic dissipation rate due to reconnection in a compressed
flow. We find reasonable agreement with the observed spectrum of Sgr A* as long
as its distribution consists of 3 primary components: an outer equipartition
field, a roughly constant field at intermediate radii (~1000 Schwarzschild
radii), and an inner dynamo (more or less within the last stable orbit for a
non-rotating black hole) which increases B to about 100 Gauss. The latter
component accounts for the observed sub-millimiter hump in this source.Comment: 33 pages including 2 figures; submitted to Ap
The extreme flare in III Zw 2: Evolution of a radio jet in a Seyfert galaxy
A very detailed monitoring of a radio flare in the Seyfert I galaxy III Zw 2
with the VLA and the VLBA is presented. The relative astrometry in the VLBA
observations was precise on a level of a few microarcseconds. Spectral and
spatial evolution of the source are closely linked and these observations
allowed us to study in great detail a textbook example of a synchrotron
self-absorbed jet. We observe a phase where the jet gets frustrated, without
expansion and no spectral evolution. Then the jet breaks free and starts to
expand with apparent superluminal motion. This expansion is accompanied by a
strong spectral evolution. The results are a good confirmation of synchrotron
theory and equipartition for jets.Comment: Astronomy & Astrophysics, accepted, 11 pages, 14 Figures, also
available at http://www.jive.nl/~brunthal/pub.shtm
Heavy neutrino ball as a possible solution to the "blackness problem" of the Galactic center
It has been recently shown (Tsiklauri & Viollier, 1998a) that the matter
concentration inferred from observed stellar motion at the galactic center
(Eckart & Genzel, 1997, MNRAS, 284, 576 and Genzel et al., 1996, ApJ, 472, 153)
is consistent with a supermassive object of solar masses,
composed of self-gravitating, degenerate heavy neutrinos. It has been
furthermore suggested (Tsiklauri & Viollier, 1998a) that the neutrino ball
scenario may have an advantage that it could possibly explain the so-called
"blackness problem" of the galactic center. Here, we present a quantitative
investigation of this statement, by calculating the emitted spectrum of Sgr
A in the framework of standard accretion disk theory.Comment: version 2, MNRAS style, submitted to MNRA
rPICARD: A CASA-based Calibration Pipeline for VLBI Data
Currently, HOPS and AIPS are the primary choices for the time-consuming
process of (millimeter) Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI) data
calibration. However, for a full end-to-end pipeline, they either lack the
ability to perform easily scriptable incremental calibration or do not provide
full control over the workflow with the ability to manipulate and edit
calibration solutions directly. The Common Astronomy Software Application
(CASA) offers all these abilities, together with a secure development future
and an intuitive Python interface, which is very attractive for young radio
astronomers. Inspired by the recent addition of a global fringe-fitter, the
capability to convert FITS-IDI files to measurement sets, and amplitude
calibration routines based on ANTAB metadata, we have developed the the
CASA-based Radboud PIpeline for the Calibration of high Angular Resolution Data
(rPICARD). The pipeline will be able to handle data from multiple arrays: EHT,
GMVA, VLBA and the EVN in the first release. Polarization and phase-referencing
calibration are supported and a spectral line mode will be added in the future.
The large bandwidths of future radio observatories ask for a scalable reduction
software. Within CASA, a message passing interface (MPI) implementation is used
for parallelization, reducing the total time needed for processing. The most
significant gain is obtained for the time-consuming fringe-fitting task where
each scan be processed in parallel.Comment: 6 pages, 1 figure, EVN 2018 symposium proceeding
The Variability of Polarized Radiation from Sgr A*
Sgr A* is variable at radio and submillimeter wavelengths on hourly time
scales showing time delays between the peaks of flare emission as well as
linearly polarized emission at millimeter and sub-mm wavelengths. To determine
the polarization characteristics of this variable source at radio frequencies,
we present VLA observations of Sgr A* and report the detection of polarized
emission at a level of 0.77\pm0.01% and 0.2\pm0.01% at 43 and 22 GHz,
respectively. The change in the time averaged polarization angle between 22 and
43 GHz corresponds to a RM of -2.5\pm0.6 x10^3 rad m{-2} with no phase wrapping
(or \sim 5x10^4 rad m^2 with 2\pi phase wrap). We also note a rise and fall
time scale of 1.5 -- 2 hours in the total polarized intensity. The light curves
of the degree of linearly polarized emission suggests a a correlation with the
variability of the total intensity at 43 GHz. The available polarization data
at radio and sub-mm wavelengths suggest that the rotation measure decreases
with decreasing frequency. This frequency dependence, and observed changes in
polarization angle during flare events, may be caused by the reduction in
rotation measure associated with the expansion of synchrotron-emitting blobs.Comment: 11 pages, 3 figures, ApJL (in press
Radioelectric Field Features of Extensive Air Showers Observed with CODALEMA
Based on a new approach to the detection of radio transients associated with
extensive air showers induced by ultra high energy cosmic rays, the
experimental apparatus CODALEMA is in operation, measuring about 1 event per
day corresponding to an energy threshold ~ 5. 10^16 eV. Its performance makes
possible for the first time the study of radio-signal features on an
event-by-event basis. The sampling of the magnitude of the electric field along
a 600 meters axis is analyzed. It shows that the electric field lateral spread
is around 250 m (FWHM). The possibility to determine with radio both arrival
directions and shower core positions is discussed.Comment: Accepted for publication in Astroparticle Physic
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