Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astrophysics
Scientific paper
1999-05-12
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astrophysics
37 pages, 11 figures, submitted to ApJ
Scientific paper
10.1086/308488
We use 1+1/2 dimensional particle-in-cell plasma simulations to study the interaction of a relativistic, strongly magnetized wind with an ambient medium. Such an interaction is a plausible mechanism which leads to generation of cosmological gamma-ray bursts. We confirm the idea of Meszaros and Rees (1992) that an essential part (about 20%) of the energy that is lost by the wind in the process of its deceleration may be transferred to high-energy electrons and then to high-frequency (X-ray and gamma-ray) emission. We show that in the wind frame the spectrum of electrons which are accelerated at the wind front and move ahead of the front is nearly a two-dimensional relativistic Maxwellian with a relativistic temperature $T=6*10^9\Gamma_T$ K, where $\Gamma_T=200\Gamma_0$ with the accuracy of ~20%, and $\Gamma_0$ is the Lorentz factor of the wind, $\Gamma_0>100$ for winds outflowing from cosmological gamma-ray bursters. Our simulations point to an existence of a high-energy tail of accelerated electrons with a Lorentz factor of more than $700\Gamma_0$. Large-amplitude electromagnetic waves are generated by the oscillating currents at the wind front. The mean field of these waves ahead of the wind front is an order of magnitude less than the magnetic field of the wind. High-energy electrons which are accelerated at the wind front and injected into the region ahead of the front generate synchro-Compton radiation in the fields of large-amplitude electromagnetic waves. This radiation closely resembles synchrotron radiation and can reproduce the non-thermal radiation of gamma-ray bursts observed in the Ginga and BATSE ranges (from a few keV to a few MeV).
Smolsky M. V.
Usov Vladimir V.
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