Turbulent magnetic relaxation in pulsar wind nebulae

Abstract

We present a model for magnetic energy dissipation in a pulsar wind nebula. Better understanding of this process is required to assess the likelihood that certain astrophysical transients may be powered by the spin-down of a "millisecond magnetar." Examples include superluminous supernovae, gamma-ray bursts, and anticipated electromagnetic counterparts to gravitational wave detections of binary neutron star coalescence. Our model leverages recent progress in the theory of turbulent magnetic relaxation to specify a dissipative closure of the stationary magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) wind equations, yielding predictions of the magnetic energy dissipation rate throughout the nebula. Synchrotron losses are treated self-consistently. To demonstrate the model's efficacy, we show that it can reproduce many features of the Crab Nebula, including its expansion speed, radiative efficiency, peak photon energy, and mean magnetic field strength. Unlike ideal MHD models of the Crab (which lead to the so-called sigma problem) our model accounts for the transition from ultra to weakly magnetized plasma flow, and for the associated heating of relativistic electrons. We discuss how the predicted heating rates may be utilized to improve upon models of particle transport and acceleration in pulsar wind nebulae. We also discuss implications for the Crab Nebula's gamma-ray flares, and point out potential modifications to models of astrophysical transients invoking the spin-down of a millisecond magnetar.

Submitted to ApJ

References in corpus (9)

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• Radiative Signatures of Plasmoid-Dominated Reconnection in Blazar Jets
• The GRB-SLSN Connection: mis-aligned magnetars, weak jet emergence, and observational signatures
• GRB and blazar jets shining through their stripes
• Gamma-ray Thermalization and Leakage from Millisecond Magnetar Nebulae: Towards a Self-Consistent Model for Superluminous Supernovae
• Dissipation of the striped pulsar wind and non-thermal particle acceleration: 3D PIC simulations
• Shock-powered radio precursors of neutron star mergers from accelerating relativistic binary winds
• Particle acceleration in explosive relativistic reconnection events and Crab Nebula gamma-ray flares
• Multi-scale dynamics of magnetic flux tubes and inverse magnetic energy transfer
• Turbulent model of Crab nebula radiation
• Statistical description of coalescing magnetic islands via magnetic reconnection
• A systematic study of $\gamma$-ray flares from the Crab Nebula with Fermi-LAT: I. flare detection
• Confinement of the Crab Nebula with tangled magnetic field by its supernova remnant
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• Pulsar Wind Nebulae
• Quasi-steady emission from repeating fast radio bursts can be explained by magnetar wind nebulae
• Inductive acceleration of ions in Poynting-flux dominated outflows
• Collisionless tearing instability in relativistic non-thermal pair plasma and its application to MHD turbulence
• Scaling of Magnetic Dissipation and Particle Acceleration in ABC Fields
• Minijets and Broken Stationarity in a Blazar : Novel Insights into the Origin of $\gamma$-ray Variability in CTA 102
• Future X-ray Polarimetry of Relativistic Accelerators: PWNe and SNRs
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