Studying the WHIM Content of the Galaxy Large-Scale Structures along the Line of Sight to H 2356-309

We make use of a 500ks Chandra HRC-S/LETG spectrum of the blazar H2356-309, combined with a lower S/N spectrum of the same target, to search for the presence of warm-hot absorbing gas associated with two Large-Scale Structures (LSSs) crossed by this sightline at z=0.062 (the Pisces-Cetus Supercluster, PCS) and at z=0.128 ("Farther Sculptor Wall", FSW). No statistically significant (>=3sigma) individual absorption is detected from any of the strong He- or H-like transitions of C, O and Ne at the redshifts of the structures. However we are still able to constrain the physical and geometrical parameters of the associated putative absorbing gas, by performing joint spectral fit of marginal detections and upper limits of the strongest expected lines with our self-consistent hybrid ionization WHIM spectral model. At the redshift of the PCS we identify a warm phase with logT=5.35_-0.13^+0.07 K and log N_H =19.1+/-0.2 cm^-2 possibly coexisting with a hotter and less significant phase with logT=6.9^+0.1_-0.8 K and log N_H=20.1^+0.3_-1.7 cm^-2 (1sigma errors). For the FSW we estimate logT=6.6_-0.2^+0.1 K and log N_H=19.8_-0.8^+0.4 cm^-2. Our constraints allow us to estimate the cumulative number density per unit redshifts of OVII WHIM absorbers. We also estimate the cosmological mass density obtaining Omega_b(WHIM)=(0.021^+0.031_-0.018) (Z/Z_sun)^-1, consistent with the mass density of the intergalactic 'missing baryons' for high metallicities.Comment: 29 pages, 8 figures, 4 tables. Accepted for publication in Ap

Minority and mode conversion heating in (3He)-H JET plasma

Radio frequency (RF) heating experiments have recently been conducted in JET (He-3)-H plasmas. This type of plasmas will be used in ITER's non-activated operation phase. Whereas a companion paper in this same PPCF issue will discuss the RF heating scenario's at half the nominal magnetic field, this paper documents the heating performance in (He-3)-H plasmas at full field, with fundamental cyclotron heating of He-3 as the only possible ion heating scheme in view of the foreseen ITER antenna frequency bandwidth. Dominant electron heating with global heating efficiencies between 30% and 70% depending on the He-3 concentration were observed and mode conversion (MC) heating proved to be as efficient as He-3 minority heating. The unwanted presence of both He-4 and D in the discharges gave rise to 2 MC layers rather than a single one. This together with the fact that the location of the high-field side fast wave (FW) cutoff is a sensitive function of the parallel wave number and that one of the locations of the wave confluences critically depends on the He-3 concentration made the interpretation of the results, although more complex, very interesting: three regimes could be distinguished as a function of X[He-3]: (i) a regime at low concentration (X[He-3] < 1.8%) at which ion cyclotron resonance frequency (ICRF) heating is efficient, (ii) a regime at intermediate concentrations (1.8 < X[He-3] < 5%) in which the RF performance is degrading and ultimately becoming very poor, and finally (iii) a good heating regime at He-3 concentrations beyond 6%. In this latter regime, the heating efficiency did not critically depend on the actual concentration while at lower concentrations (X[He-3] < 4%) a bigger excursion in heating efficiency is observed and the estimates differ somewhat from shot to shot, also depending on whether local or global signals are chosen for the analysis. The different dynamics at the various concentrations can be traced back to the presence of 2 MC layers and their associated FW cutoffs residing inside the plasma at low He-3 concentration. One of these layers is approaching and crossing the low-field side plasma edge when 1.8 < X[He-3] < 5%. Adopting a minimization procedure to correlate the MC positions with the plasma composition reveals that the different behaviors observed are due to contamination of the plasma. Wave modeling not only supports this interpretation but also shows that moderate concentrations of D-like species significantly alter the overall wave behavior in He-3-H plasmas. Whereas numerical modeling yields quantitative information on the heating efficiency, analytical work gives a good description of the dominant underlying wave interaction physics

The Collision Between The Milky Way And Andromeda

We use a N--body/hydrodynamic simulation to forecast the future encounter between the Milky Way and the Andromeda galaxies, given current observational constraints on their relative distance, relative velocity, and masses. Allowing for a comparable amount of diffuse mass to fill the volume of the Local Group, we find that the two galaxies are likely to collide in a few billion years - within the Sun's lifetime. During the the interaction, there is a chance that the Sun will be pulled away from its present orbital radius and reside in an extended tidal tail. The likelihood for this outcome increases as the merger progresses, and there is a remote possibility that our Sun will be more tightly bound to Andromeda than to the Milky Way before the final merger. Eventually, after the merger has completed, the Sun is most likely to be scattered to the outer halo and reside at much larger radii (>30 kpc). The density profiles of the stars, gas and dark matter in the merger product resemble those of elliptical galaxies. Our Local Group model therefore provides a prototype progenitor of late--forming elliptical galaxies.Comment: accepted to MNRA

Numerical simulations of the Warm-Hot Intergalactic Medium

In this paper we review the current predictions of numerical simulations for the origin and observability of the warm hot intergalactic medium (WHIM), the diffuse gas that contains up to 50 per cent of the baryons at z~0. During structure formation, gravitational accretion shocks emerging from collapsing regions gradually heat the intergalactic medium (IGM) to temperatures in the range T~10^5-10^7 K. The WHIM is predicted to radiate most of its energy in the ultraviolet (UV) and X-ray bands and to contribute a significant fraction of the soft X-ray background emission. While O VI and C IV absorption systems arising in the cooler fraction of the WHIM with T~10^5-10^5.5 K are seen in FUSE and HST observations, models agree that current X-ray telescopes such as Chandra and XMM-Newton do not have enough sensitivity to detect the hotter WHIM. However, future missions such as Constellation-X and XEUS might be able to detect both emission lines and absorption systems from highly ionised atoms such as O VII, O VIII and Fe XVII.Comment: 18 pages, 5 figures, accepted for publication in Space Science Reviews, special issue "Clusters of galaxies: beyond the thermal view", Editor J.S. Kaastra, Chapter 14; work done by an international team at the International Space Science Institute (ISSI), Bern, organised by J.S. Kaastra, A.M. Bykov, S. Schindler & J.A.M. Bleeke

Control of neoclassical tearing modes by Sawtooth control

The onset of a neoclassical tearing mode (NTM) depends on the existence of a large enough seed island. It is shown in the Joint European Torus that NTMs can be readily destabilized by long-period sawteeth, such as obtained by sawtooth stabilization from ion-cyclotron heating or current drive. This has important implications for burning plasma scenarios, as alpha particles strongly stabilize the sawteeth. It is also shown that, by adding heating and current drive just outside the inversion radius, sawteeth are destabilized, resulting in shorter sawtooth periods and larger beta values being obtained without NTMs

Community structure and patterns of scientific collaboration in Business and Management

This is the author's accepted version of this article deposited at arXiv (arXiv:1006.1788v2 [physics.soc-ph]) and subsequently published in Scientometrics October 2011, Volume 89, Issue 1, pp 381-396. The final publication is available at link.springer.com http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs11192-011-0439-1Author's note: 17 pages. To appear in special edition of Scientometrics. Abstract on arXiv meta-data a shorter version of abstract on actual paper (both in journal and arXiv full pape

Equilibration processes in the Warm-Hot Intergalactic Medium

The Warm-Hot Intergalactic Medium (WHIM) is thought to contribute about 40-50 % to the baryonic budget at the present evolution stage of the universe. The observed large scale structure is likely to be due to gravitational growth of density fluctuations in the post-inflation era. The evolving cosmic web is governed by non-linear gravitational growth of the initially weak density fluctuations in the dark energy dominated cosmology. Non-linear structure formation, accretion and merging processes, star forming and AGN activity produce gas shocks in the WHIM. Shock waves are converting a fraction of the gravitation power to thermal and non-thermal emission of baryonic/leptonic matter. They provide the most likely way to power the luminous matter in the WHIM. The plasma shocks in the WHIM are expected to be collisionless. Collisionless shocks produce a highly non-equilibrium state with anisotropic temperatures and a large differences in ion and electron temperatures. We discuss the ion and electron heating by the collisionless shocks and then review the plasma processes responsible for the Coulomb equilibration and collisional ionisation equilibrium of oxygen ions in the WHIM. MHD-turbulence produced by the strong collisionless shocks could provide a sizeable non-thermal contribution to the observed Doppler parameter of the UV line spectra of the WHIM.Comment: 13 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in Space Science Reviews, special issue "Clusters of galaxies: beyond the thermal view", Editor J.S. Kaastra, Chapter 8; work done by an international team at the International Space Science Institute (ISSI), Bern, organised by J.S. Kaastra, A.M. Bykov, S. Schindler & J.A.M. Bleeke

Dual sightline measurements of MeV range deuterons with neutron and gamma-ray spectroscopy at JET

Observations made in a JET experiment aimed at accelerating deuterons to the MeV range by third harmonic radio-frequency (RF) heating coupled into a deuterium beam are reported. Measurements are based on a set of advanced neutron and gamma-ray spectrometers that, for the first time, observe the plasma simultaneously along vertical and oblique lines of sight. Parameters of the fast ion energy distribution, such as the high energy cut-off of the deuteron distribution function and the RF coupling constant, are determined from data within a uniform analysis framework for neutron and gamma-ray spectroscopy based on a one-dimensional model and by a consistency check among the individual measurement techniques. A systematic difference is seen between the two lines of sight and is interpreted to originate from the sensitivity of the oblique detectors to the pitch-angle structure of the distribution around the resonance, which is not correctly portrayed within the adopted one dimensional model. A framework to calculate neutron and gamma-ray emission from a spatially resolved, two-dimensional deuteron distribution specified by energy/pitch is thus developed and used for a first comparison with predictions from ab initio models of RF heating at multiple harmonics. The results presented in this paper are of relevance for the development of advanced diagnostic techniques for MeV range ions in high performance fusion plasmas, with applications to the experimental validation of RF heating codes and, more generally, to studies of the energy distribution of ions in the MeV range in high performance deuterium and deuterium-tritium plasmas.This work has been carried out within the framework of the EUROfusion Consortium and has received funding from the Euratom research and training programme 2014-2018 under grant agreement No 633053. The views and opinions expressed herein do not necessarily reflect those of the European Commission.Postprint (author's final draft

Hydrogen-like nitrogen radio line from hot interstellar and warm-hot intergalactic gas

Hyperfine structure lines of highly-charged ions may open a new window in observations of hot rarefied astrophysical plasmas. In this paper we discuss spectral lines of isotopes and ions abundant at temperatures 10^5-10^7 K, characteristic for warm-hot intergalactic medium, hot interstellar medium, starburst galaxies, their superwinds and young supernova remnants. Observations of these lines will allow to study bulk and turbulent motions of the observed target and will broaden the information about the gas ionization state, chemical and isotopic composition. The most prospective is the line of the major nitrogen isotope having wavelength 5.65 mm (Sunyaev and Churazov 1084). Wavelength of this line is well-suited for observation of objects at z=0.15-0.6 when it is redshifted to 6.5-9 mm spectral band widely-used in ground-based radio observations, and, for example, for z>=1.3, when the line can be observed in 1.3 cm band and at lower frequencies. Modern and future radio telescopes and interferometers are able to observe the absorption by 14-N VII in the warm-hot intergalactic medium at redshifts above z=0.15 in spectra of brightest mm-band sources. Sub-millimeter emission lines of several most abundant isotopes having hyperfine splitting might also be detected in spectra of young supernova remnants.Comment: 12 pages, 5 figures, accepted by Astronomy Letters; v3: details added; error fixe