Simple shock isolator synthesis with bilinear stiffness and variable damping

Simple shock isolator synthesis with bilinear stiffness and variable dampin

Magnetic Reconnection with Radiative Cooling. I. Optically-Thin Regime

Magnetic reconnection, a fundamental plasma process associated with a rapid dissipation of magnetic energy, is believed to power many disruptive phenomena in laboratory plasma devices, the Earth magnetosphere, and the solar corona. Traditional reconnection research, geared towards these rather tenuous environments, has justifiably ignored the effects of radiation on the reconnection process. However, in many reconnecting systems in high-energy astrophysics (e.g., accretion-disk coronae, relativistic jets, magnetar flares) and, potentially, in powerful laser plasma and z-pinch experiments, the energy density is so high that radiation, in particular radiative cooling, may start to play an important role. This observation motivates the development of a theory of high-energy-density radiative magnetic reconnection. As a first step towards this goal, we present in this paper a simple Sweet--Parker-like theory of non-relativistic resistive-MHD reconnection with strong radiative cooling. First, we show how, in the absence of a guide magnetic field, intense cooling leads to a strong compression of the plasma in the reconnection layer, resulting in a higher reconnection rate. The compression ratio and the layer temperature are determined by the balance between ohmic heating and radiative cooling. The lower temperature in the radiatively-cooled layer leads to a higher Spitzer resistivity and hence to an extra enhancement of the reconnection rate. We then apply our general theory to several specific astrophysically important radiative processes (bremsstrahlung, cyclotron, and inverse-Compton) in the optically thin regime, for both the zero- and strong-guide-field cases. We derive specific expressions for key reconnection parameters, including the reconnection rate. We also discuss the limitations and conditions for applicability of our theory.Comment: 31 pages, 1 figur

Predicted FeII Emission-Line Strengths from Active Galactic Nuclei

We present theoretical FeII emission line strengths for physical conditions typical of Active Galactic Nuclei with Broad-Line Regions. The FeII line strengths were computed with a precise treatment of radiative transfer using extensive and accurate atomic data from the Iron Project. Excitation mechanisms for the FeII emission included continuum fluorescence, collisional excitation, self-fluorescence amoung the FeII transitions, and fluorescent excitation by Lyman-alpha and Lyman-beta. A large FeII atomic model consisting of 827 fine structure levels (including states to E ~ 15 eV) was used to predict fluxes for approximately 23,000 FeII transitions, covering most of the UV, optical, and IR wavelengths of astrophysical interest. Spectral synthesis for wavelengths from 1600 Angstroms to 1.2 microns is presented. Applications of present theoretical templates to the analysis of observations are described. In particular, we discuss recent observations of near-IR FeII lines in the 8500 Angstrom -- 1 micron region which are predicted by the Lyman-alpha fluorescence mechanism. We also compare our UV spectral synthesis with an empirical iron template for the prototypical, narrow-line Seyfert galaxy I Zw 1. The theoretical FeII template presented in this work should also applicable to a variety of objects with FeII spectra formed under similar excitation conditions, such as supernovae and symbiotic stars.Comment: 33 pages, 15 postscript figure

Cosmic Microwave Background Polarization

Cosmic microwave background (CMB) anisotropy is our richest source of cosmological information; the standard cosmological model was largely established thanks to study of the temperature anisotropies. By the end of the decade, the Planck satellite will close this important chapter and move us deeper into the new frontier of polarization measurements. Numerous ground--based and balloon--borne experiments are already forging into this new territory. Besides providing new and independent information on the primordial density perturbations and cosmological parameters, polarization measurements offer the potential to detect primordial gravity waves, constrain dark energy and measure the neutrino mass scale. A vigorous experimental program is underway worldwide and heading towards a new satellite mission dedicated to CMB polarization.Comment: Review given at TAUP 2005; References added; Additional reference

Thermal instability of an expanding dusty plasma with equilibrium cooling

We present an analysis of radiation induced instabilities in an expanding plasma with considerable presence of dust particles and equilibrium cooling. We have shown that the equilibrium expansion and cooling destabilize the radiation condensation modes and the presence of dust particles enhances this effect. We have examined our results in the context of ionized, dusty-plasma environments such as those found in planetary nebulae (PNe). We show that due to the non-static equilibrium and finite equilibrium cooling, small-scale localized structures formed out of thermal instability, become transient, which agrees with the observational results. The dust-charge fluctuation is found to heavily suppress these instabilities, though in view of non-availability of convincing experimental data, a definitive conclusion could not be made.Comment: 23 pages, 14 figure

Viruses, variants and vaccines

The current SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has brought a number of major global clinical, sociological and economic issues into sharp focus. We address some of these issues, focusing on short-term factors such as virus mutations and vaccine efficacy, and also considering the longer-term implications of the current pandemic. We discuss societal responses to the presence of a pathogen that will probably remain in circulation for decades or longer, and to future new emergent viruses

Electron beam induced radio emission from ultracool dwarfs

We present the numerical simulations for an electron-beam-driven and loss-cone-driven electron-cyclotron maser (ECM) with different plasma parameters and different magnetic field strengths for a relatively small region and short time-scale in an attempt to interpret the recent discovered intense radio emission from ultracool dwarfs. We find that a large amount of electromagnetic field energy can be effectively released from the beam-driven ECM, which rapidly heats the surrounding plasma. A rapidly developed high-energy tail of electrons in velocity space (resulting from the heating process of the ECM) may produce the radio continuum depending on the initial strength of the external magnetic field and the electron beam current. Both significant linear polarization and circular polarization of electromagnetic waves can be obtained from the simulations. The spectral energy distributions of the simulated radio waves show that harmonics may appear from 10 to 70$\nu_{\rm pe}$ ($\nu_{\rm pe}$ is the electron plasma frequency) in the non-relativistic case and from 10 to 600$\nu_{\rm pe}$ in the relativistic case, which makes it difficult to find the fundamental cyclotron frequency in the observed radio frequencies. A wide frequency band should therefore be covered by future radio observations.Comment: 10 pages, 19 figures, accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journa

Measuring the Small-Scale Power Spectrum of Cosmic Density Fluctuations Through 21 cm Tomography Prior to the Epoch of Structure Formation

The thermal evolution of the cosmic gas decoupled from that of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) at a redshift z~200. Afterwards and before the first stars had formed, the cosmic neutral hydrogen absorbed the CMB flux at its resonant 21cm spin-flip transition. We calculate the evolution of the spin temperature for this transition and the resulting anisotropies that are imprinted on the CMB sky due to linear density fluctuations during this epoch. These anisotropies at an observed wavelength of 10.56[(1+z)/50] meters, contain an amount of information that is orders of magnitude larger than any other cosmological probe. Their detection, although challenging, could tightly constrain any possible running of the spectral index from inflation (as suggested by WMAP), small deviations from Gaussianity, or any significant contribution from neutrinos or warm dark matter to the cosmic mass budget.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures, accepted for publication in Physical Review Letter

Direct observation of Levy flight of holes in bulk n-InP

We study the photoluminescence spectra excited at an edge side of n-InP slabs and observed from the broadside. In a moderately doped sample the intensity drops off as a power-law function of the distance from the excitation - up to several millimeters - with no change in the spectral shape.The hole distribution is described by a stationary Levy-flight process over more than two orders of magnitude in both the distance and hole concentration. For heavily-doped samples, the power law is truncated by free-carrier absorption. Our experiments are near-perfectly described by the Biberman-Holstein transport equation with parameters found from independent optical experiments.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure