395 research outputs found
Multi-D magnetohydrodynamic modelling of pulsar wind nebulae: recent progress and open questions
In the last decade, the relativistic magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) modelling of
pulsar wind nebulae, and of the Crab nebula in particular, has been highly
successful, with many of the observed dynamical and emission properties
reproduced down to the finest detail. Here, we critically discuss the results
of some of the most recent studies: namely the investigation of the origin of
the radio emitting particles and the quest for the acceleration sites of
particles of different energies along the termination shock, by using wisps
motion as a diagnostic tool; the study of the magnetic dissipation process in
high magnetization nebulae by means of new long-term three-dimensional
simulations of the pulsar wind nebula evolution; the investigation of the
relativistic tearing instability in thinning current sheets, leading to fast
reconnection events that might be at the origin of the Crab nebula gamma-ray
flares.Comment: 30 pages, 12 figure
Two-component jet simulations: II. Combining analytical disk and stellar MHD outflow solutions
Theoretical arguments along with observational data of YSO jets suggest the
presence of two steady components: a disk wind type outflow needed to explain
the observed high mass loss rates and a stellar wind type outflow probably
accounting for the observed stellar spin down.
Each component's contribution depends on the intrinsic physical properties of
the YSO-disk system and its evolutionary stage. The main goal of this paper is
to understand some of the basic features of the evolution, interaction and
co-existence of the two jet components over a parameter space and when time
variability is enforced. Having studied separately the numerical evolution of
each type of the complementary disk and stellar analytical wind solutions in
Paper I of this series, we proceed here to mix together the two models inside
the computational box. The evolution in time is performed with the PLUTO code,
investigating the dynamics of the two-component jets, the modifications each
solution undergoes and the potential steady state reached.Comment: accepted for publication in A&
Two-component jet simulations: I. Topological stability of analytical MHD outflow solutions
Observations of collimated outflows in young stellar objects indicate that
several features of the jets can be understood by adopting the picture of a
two-component outflow, wherein a central stellar component around the jet axis
is surrounded by an extended disk-wind. The precise contribution of each
component may depend on the intrinsic physical properties of the YSO-disk
system as well as its evolutionary stage. In this context, the present article
starts a systematic investigation of two-component jet models via
time-dependent simulations of two prototypical and complementary analytical
solutions, each closely related to the properties of stellar-outflows and
disk-winds. These models describe a meridionally and a radially self-similar
exact solution of the steady-state, ideal hydromagnetic equations,
respectively. By using the PLUTO code to carry out the simulations, the study
focuses on the topological stability of each of the two analytical solutions,
which are successfully extended to all space by removing their singularities.
In addition, their behavior and robustness over several physical and numerical
modifications is extensively examined. It is found that radially self-similar
solutions (disk-winds) always reach a final steady-state while maintaining all
their well-defined properties. The different ways to replace the singular part
of the solution around the symmetry axis, being a first approximation towards a
two-component outflow, lead to the appearance of a shock at the super-fast
domain corresponding to the fast magnetosonic separatrix surface. Conversely,
the asymptotic configuration and the stability of meridionally self-similar
models (stellar-winds) is related to the heating processes at the base of the
wind.Comment: Accepted for publication in A&
Models of the circumstellar medium of evolving, massive runaway stars moving through the Galactic plane
At least 5 per cent of the massive stars are moving supersonically through
the interstellar medium (ISM) and are expected to produce a stellar wind bow
shock. We explore how the mass loss and space velocity of massive runaway stars
affect the morphology of their bow shocks. We run two-dimensional axisymmetric
hydrodynamical simulations following the evolution of the circumstellar medium
of these stars in the Galactic plane from the main sequence to the red
supergiant phase. We find that thermal conduction is an important process
governing the shape, size and structure of the bow shocks around hot stars, and
that they have an optical luminosity mainly produced by forbidden lines, e.g.
[OIII]. The Ha emission of the bow shocks around hot stars originates from near
their contact discontinuity. The H emission of bow shocks around cool
stars originates from their forward shock, and is too faint to be observed for
the bow shocks that we simulate. The emission of optically-thin radiation
mainly comes from the shocked ISM material. All bow shock models are brighter
in the infrared, i.e. the infrared is the most appropriate waveband to search
for bow shocks. Our study suggests that the infrared emission comes from near
the contact discontinuity for bow shocks of hot stars and from the inner region
of shocked wind for bow shocks around cool stars. We predict that, in the
Galactic plane, the brightest, i.e. the most easily detectable bow shocks are
produced by high-mass stars moving with small space velocities.Comment: 22 pages, 24 figure
ECHAD: Embedding-Based Change Detection from Multivariate Time Series in Smart Grids
Smart grids are power grids where clients may actively participate in energy production, storage and distribution. Smart grid management raises several challenges, including the possible changes and evolutions in terms of energy consumption and production, that must be taken into account in order to properly regulate the energy distribution. In this context, machine learning methods can be fruitfully adopted to support the analysis and to predict the behavior of smart grids, by exploiting the large amount of streaming data generated by sensor networks. In this article, we propose a novel change detection method, called ECHAD (Embedding-based CHAnge Detection), that leverages embedding techniques, one-class learning, and a dynamic detection approach that incrementally updates the learned model to reflect the new data distribution. Our experiments show that ECHAD achieves optimal performances on synthetic data representing challenging scenarios. Moreover, a qualitative analysis of the results obtained on real data of a real power grid reveals the quality of the change detection of ECHAD. Specifically, a comparison with state-of-the-art approaches shows the ability of ECHAD in identifying additional relevant changes, not detected by competitors, avoiding false positive detections
Spatially-Aware Autoencoders for Detecting Contextual Anomalies in Geo-Distributed Data
The huge amount of data generated by sensor networks enables many potential analyses. However, one important limiting factor for the analyses of sensor data is the possible presence of anomalies, which may affect the validity of any conclusion we could draw. This aspect motivates the adoption of a preliminary anomaly detection method. Existing methods usually do not consider the spatial nature of data generated by sensor networks. Properly modeling the spatial nature of the data, by explicitly considering spatial autocorrelation phenomena, has the potential to highlight the degree of agreement or disagreement of multiple sensor measurements located in different geographical positions. The intuition is that one could improve anomaly detection performance by considering the spatial context. In this paper, we propose a spatially-aware anomaly detection method based on a stacked auto-encoder architecture. Specifically, the proposed architecture includes a specific encoding stage that models the spatial autocorrelation in data observed at different locations. Finally, a distance-based approach leverages the embedding features returned by the auto-encoder to identify possible anomalies. Our experimental evaluation on real-world geo-distributed data collected from renewable energy plants shows the effectiveness of the proposed method, also when compared to state-of-the-art anomaly detection methods
Young stellar object jet models: From theory to synthetic observations
Astronomical observations, analytical solutions and numerical simulations
have provided the building blocks to formulate the current theory of young
stellar object jets. Although each approach has made great progress
independently, it is only during the last decade that significant efforts are
being made to bring the separate pieces together. Building on previous work
that combined analytical solutions and numerical simulations, we apply a
sophisticated cooling function to incorporate optically thin energy losses in
the dynamics. On the one hand, this allows a self-consistent treatment of the
jet evolution and on the other, it provides the necessary data to generate
synthetic emission maps. Firstly, analytical disk and stellar outflow solutions
are properly combined to initialize numerical two-component jet models inside
the computational box. Secondly, magneto-hydrodynamical simulations are
performed in 2.5D, following properly the ionization and recombination of a
maximum of ions. Finally, the outputs are post-processed to produce
artificial observational data. The first two-component jet simulations, based
on analytical models, that include ionization and optically thin radiation
losses demonstrate promising results for modeling specific young stellar object
outflows. The generation of synthetic emission maps provides the link to
observations, as well as the necessary feedback for the further improvement of
the available models.Comment: accepted for publication A&A, 20 pages, 11 figure
Turbulence and Steady Flows in 3D Global Stratified MHD Simulations of Accretion Disks
We present full 2 Pi global 3-D stratified MHD simulations of accretion
disks. We interpret our results in the context of proto-planetary disks. We
investigate the turbulence driven by the magneto-rotational instability (MRI)
using the PLUTO Godunov code in spherical coordinates with the accurate and
robust HLLD Riemann solver. We follow the turbulence for more than 1500 orbits
at the innermost radius of the domain to measure the overall strength of
turbulent motions and the detailed accretion flow pattern. We find that regions
within two scale heights of the midplane have a turbulent Mach number of about
0.1 and a magnetic pressure two to three orders of magnitude less than the gas
pressure, while outside three scale heights the magnetic pressure equals or
exceeds the gas pressure and the turbulence is transonic, leading to large
density fluctuations. The strongest large-scale density disturbances are spiral
density waves, and the strongest of these waves has m=5. No clear meridional
circulation appears in the calculations because fluctuating radial pressure
gradients lead to changes in the orbital frequency, comparable in importance to
the stress gradients that drive the meridional flows in viscous models. The net
mass flow rate is well-reproduced by a viscous model using the mean stress
distribution taken from the MHD calculation. The strength of the mean turbulent
magnetic field is inversely proportional to the radius, so the fields are
approximately force-free on the largest scales. Consequently the accretion
stress falls off as the inverse square of the radius.Comment: Accepted for publication in Ap
Velocity asymmetries in YSO jets: Intrinsic and extrinsic mechanisms
It is a well established fact that some YSO jets (e.g. RW Aur) display
different propagation speeds between their blue and red shifted parts, a
feature possibly associated with the central engine or the environment in which
the jet propagates. In order to understand the origin of asymmetric YSO jet
velocities, we investigate the efficiency of two candidate mechanisms, one
based on the intrinsic properties of the system and one based on the role of
the external medium. In particular, a parallel or anti-parallel configuration
between the protostellar magnetosphere and the disk magnetic field is
considered and the resulting dynamics are examined both in an ideal and a
resistive magneto-hydrodynamical (MHD) regime. Moreover, we explore the effects
of a potential difference in the pressure of the environment, as a consequence
of the non-uniform density distribution of molecular clouds. Ideal and
resistive axisymmetric numerical simulations are carried out for a variety of
models, all of which are based on a combination of two analytical solutions, a
disk wind and a stellar outflow. We find that jet velocity asymmetries can
indeed occur both when multipolar magnetic moments are present in the star-disk
system as well as when non-uniform environments are considered. The latter case
is an external mechanism that can easily explain the large time scale of the
phenomenon, whereas the former one naturally relates it to the YSO intrinsic
properties. [abridged]Comment: accepted for publication in A&
- …