Physics
Scientific paper
Jul 2009
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2009hst..prop12271s&link_type=abstract
HST Proposal ID #12271. Cycle 18
Physics
Scientific paper
We recently detected high temperature gas at 10^5K associated with the low excitation 10^4K line emission filaments of M87. This is a profoundly important observation bearing on the physics of transport processes in cool core clusters. We propose to delve deeper into the physics of cool core clusters. We propose to use ACS to compare the spatial extent and morphology of the low and high temperature gas, to use the timely presence of COS to obtain a sensitive FUV spectrum of the hot gas, and, by introducing the notion of emission line polarimetry, seek a a potentially revolutionary new plasma diagnostic. The spatial distributions will reveal whether the hotter material is more spatially extended than the cooler; the FUV spectrum will permit derivation of the emission measure {essentially amount of gas} at each temperature between the 10^4K Halpha filaments and coronal gas at 10^7K. Together these strongly constrain plausible transport processes relating the hot and cool gas phases in this cool core cluster region, and hence the dominant physical processes at work. A novel ingredient is to obtain the optical images in polarimetric mode to probe emission line polarization levels, a diagnostic used in Solar physics to determine the relevance of collisional excitation processes such as electron impact polarization in thermal conduction or shocks. With this suite of straightforward, uniquely HST observations we may dramatically change the landscape of our understanding of the physics of cool core clusters;
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