Relativistic Magnetohydrodynamics with Application to Gamma-Ray Burst Outflows: I. Theory and Semianalytic Trans-Alfvenic Solutions

Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astrophysics

Scientific paper

Rate now

  [ 0.00 ] – not rated yet Voters 0   Comments 0

Details

22 pages, 5 figures, submitted to the Astrophysical Journal. The companion paper is astro-ph/0303483

Scientific paper

10.1086/378226

We present a general formulation of special-relativistic magnetohydrodynamics and derive exact radially self-similar solutions for axisymmetric outflows from strongly magnetized, rotating compact objects. We generalize previous work by including thermal effects and analyze in detail the various forces that guide, accelerate, and collimate the flow. We demonstrate that, under the assumptions of a quasi-steady poloidal magnetic field and of a highly relativistic poloidal velocity, the equations become effectively time-independent and the motion can be described as a frozen pulse. We concentrate on trans-Alfvenic solutions and consider outflows that are super-Alfvenic throughout in the companion paper. Our results are applicable to relativistic jets in gamma-ray burst (GRB) sources, active galactic nuclei, and microquasars, but our discussion focuses on GRBs. We envision the outflows in this case to initially consist of a hot and optically thick mixture of baryons, electron-positron pairs, and photons. We show that the flow is at first accelerated thermally but that the bulk of the acceleration is magnetic, with the asymptotic Lorentz factor corresponding to a rough equipartition between the Poynting and kinetic-energy fluxes (i.e., \~50% of the injected total energy is converted into baryonic kinetic energy). The electromagnetic forces also strongly collimate the flow, giving rise to an asymptotically cylindrical structure.

No associations

LandOfFree

Say what you really think

Search LandOfFree.com for scientists and scientific papers. Rate them and share your experience with other people.

Rating

Relativistic Magnetohydrodynamics with Application to Gamma-Ray Burst Outflows: I. Theory and Semianalytic Trans-Alfvenic Solutions does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.

If you have personal experience with Relativistic Magnetohydrodynamics with Application to Gamma-Ray Burst Outflows: I. Theory and Semianalytic Trans-Alfvenic Solutions, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Relativistic Magnetohydrodynamics with Application to Gamma-Ray Burst Outflows: I. Theory and Semianalytic Trans-Alfvenic Solutions will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

     

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-153622

  Search
All data on this website is collected from public sources. Our data reflects the most accurate information available at the time of publication.