Mass-loading of bow shock pulsar wind nebulae

Abstract

We investigate the dynamics of bow shock nebulae created by pulsars moving supersonically through a partially ionized interstellar medium. A fraction of interstellar neutral hydrogen atoms penetrating into the tail region of a pulsar wind will undergo photo-ionization due to the UV light emitted by the nebula, with the resulting mass loading dramatically changing the flow dynamics of the light leptonic pulsar wind. Using a quasi 1-D hydrodynamic model of both non-relativistic and relativistic flow, and focusing on scales much larger than the stand-off distance, we find that if a relatively small density of neutral hydrogen, as low as $10^{-4}{\text{cm}}^{-3}$, penetrate inside the pulsar wind, this is sufficient to strongly affect the tail flow. Mass loading leads to the fast expansion of the pulsar wind tail, making the tail flow intrinsically non-stationary. The shapes predicted for the bow shock nebulae compare well with observations, both in H$\alpha$ and X-rays.

18 pages, 10 figures. Accepted for publication in MNRAS

References in corpus (6)

• 30 Glitches in slow pulsars
• Modelling the high-energy emission from gamma-ray binaries using numerical relativistic hydrodynamics
• X-ray Observations of Parsec-Scale Tails behind Two Middle-Aged Pulsars
• Three-dimensional hydrodynamic simulations of asymmetric pulsar wind bow shocks
• Searches for diffuse X-ray emission around millisecond pulsars: An X-ray nebula associated with PSR J2124-3358
• Radio and X-ray nebulae associated with PSR J1509-5850

Cited by in corpus (29)

• Geminga's puzzling pulsar wind nebula
• Pulsar Wind Nebulae Created by Fast-Moving Pulsars
• Pulsar-wind nebulae and magnetar outflows: observations at radio, X-ray, and gamma-ray wavelengths
• Constraining Relativistic Bow Shock Properties in Rotation-Powered Millisecond Pulsar Binaries
• 3D dynamics and morphology of bow-shock Pulsar Wind Nebulae
• Chandra Observations of Outflows from PSR J1509-5850
• A closer view of the IGR J11014-6103 outflows
• Deep Chandra Observations of the Pulsar Wind Nebula Created by PSR B0355+54
• Full-3D relativistic MHD simulations of Bow Shock Pulsar Wind Nebulae: dynamics
• On the Radio Emitting Particles of the Crab Nebula: Stochastic Acceleration Model
• Full-3D relativistic MHD simulations of bow shock pulsar wind nebulae: emission and polarization
• The Mouse Pulsar Wind Nebula
• First Detection of a Pulsar Bow Shock Nebula in Far-UV: PSR J0437-4715
• PSR J2030+4415's Remarkable Bow Shock, PWN and Filament
• From young to old: the evolutionary path of Pulsar Wind Nebulae
• Non-thermal radiation from a pulsar wind interacting with an inhomogeneous stellar wind
• A Laminar Model for the Magnetic Field Structure in Bow-Shock Pulsar Wind Nebulae
• Modelling the bow shock Pulsar Wind Nebulae propagating through a non-uniform ISM
• A Search for TeV Gamma-ray Emission from Pulsar Tails by VERITAS
• Evolved Pulsar Wind Nebulae
• Bow-shock Pulsar Wind Nebulae Passing Through Density Discontinuities
• Numerical simulations of mass loading in the tails of Bow Shock Pulsar Wind Nebulae
• 3D Relativistic MHD Simulations of Pulsar Bow Shock Nebulae
• Discovery of a Synchrotron Bubble Associated with PSR J1015-5719
• Resolving the bow shock and tail of the cannonball pulsar PSR J0002+6216
• Mirages and Large TeV Halo-Pulsar Offsets from Cosmic Ray Propagation
• Fast moving pulsars as probes of interstellar medium
• "The Goose" Pulsar Wind Nebula of PSR J1016-5857: The Birth of a Plerion
• The Potential for Hadronic Particle Acceleration in Galactic Pulsar Wind Nebulae