Polarization Spectra of Synchrotron Radiation and the Plasma Composition of Relativistic Jets

Details Polarization Spectra of Synchrotron Radiation and the Plasma Composition of Relativistic Jets Polarization Spectra of Synchrotron Radiation and the Plasma Composition of Relativistic Jets

Nov 2002

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2002astl...28..727z&link_type=abstract

Astronomy Letters, Vol. 28, Issue 11, pp. 727-744

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astronomy

12

Galaxies: Active, Galaxies: Jets, Quasars: Individual: 3C279, Galaxies: Active: Individual: Bl Lacertae, Microquasars: Individual: Grs1915+105

Scientific paper

We investigate the problem of determining the plasma composition of relativistic jets in blazars and microquasars from the polarization frequency spectra of their synchrotron radiation. The effect of plasma composition on this radiation is attributable to a change in the structure of the ordinary and extraordinary waves in plasma, depending on the presence of a nonrelativistic electron-proton component in it and on the type of relativistic particles (electrons, positrons). The structure of the normal waves determines the properties of the observed radiation and primarily the shape of the polarization frequency spectrum. Our analytic calculations of the polarization spectra for simple models of jets with a uniform magnetic field and with a magnetic-field shear revealed characteristic features in the polarization spectra. These features allow us to differentiate between the synchrotron radiation from an admixture of relativistic particles in a cold plasma and the radiation from a relativistic plasma. However, definitive conclusions regarding the relativistic plasma composition (electrons or electron-positron pairs) can be reached only by a detailed analysis of the polarization frequency spectra that will be obtained in future radioastronomical studies with high angular and frequency resolutions.

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