Hot gas heating via magnetic arms in spiral galaxies. The case of M 83
arXiv:2006.09240 · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202037842
Abstract
Reconnection heating has been considered as a potential source of the heating of the interstellar medium. In some galaxies, significant polarised radio emission has been found between the spiral arms. This emission has a form of `magnetic arms' that resembles the spiral structure of the galaxy. Reconnection effects could convert some of the energy of the turbulent magnetic field into the thermal energy of the surrounding medium, leaving more ordered magnetic fields, as is observed in the magnetic arms. Sensitive radio and X-ray data for the grand-design spiral galaxy M 83 are used for a detailed analysis of the possible interactions of magnetic fields with hot gas, including a search for signatures of gas heating by magnetic reconnection effects. Magnetic field strengths and energies derived from the radio emission are compared with the parameters of the hot gas calculated from the model fits to sensitive X-ray spectra of the hot gas emission. The available X-ray data allowed us to distinguish two thermal components in the halo of M 83. We found slightly higher average temperatures of the hot gas in the interarm regions, which results in higher energies per particle and is accompanied by a decrease in the energy density of the magnetic fields. The observed differences in the energy budget between the spiral arms and the interarm regions suggest that, similar to the case of another spiral galaxy NGC 6946, we may be observing hints for gas heating by magnetic reconnection effects in the interarm regions. These effects, which act more efficiently on the turbulent component of the magnetic field, are expected to be stronger in the spiral arms. However, with the present data it is only possible to trace them in the interarm regions, where the star formation and the resulting turbulence is low.
arXiv comment15 pages, 10 figures, A&A accepted
References in corpus (25)
- The Leiden/Argentine/Bonn (LAB) Survey of Galactic HI: Final data release of the combined LDS and IAR surveys with improved stray-radiation corrections
- The European Photon Imaging Camera on XMM-Newton: The MOS Cameras
- HyperLEDA. III. The catalogue of extragalactic distances
- An Overview of the Performance and Scientific Results from the Chandra X-Ray Observatory (CXO)
- Cosmicflows-3
- Revised equipartition & minimum energy formula for magnetic field strength estimates from radio synchrotron observations
- The 2-8 keV cosmic X-ray background spectrum as observed with XMM-Newton
- A high spatial resolution X-ray and H-alpha study of hot gas in the halos of star-forming disk galaxies. I. Spatial and spectral properties of the diffuse X-ray emission
- Magnetism in the spiral galaxy NGC 6946: magnetic arms, depolarization rings, dynamo modes and helical fields
- The XMM-Newton EPIC Background and the production of Background Blank Sky Event Files
- Evidence for an Additional Heat Source in the Warm Ionized Medium of Galaxies
- CI and CO in the Spiral Galaxies NGC 6946 and M 83
- Molecular gas in the galaxy M83. I - The molecular gas distribution
- X-ray emission from the extended disks of spiral galaxies
- A Deep Chandra ACIS Survey of M83
- The MALATANG Survey: the L_gas-L_IR correlation on sub-kiloparsec scale in six nearby star-forming galaxies as traced by HCN J=4-3 and HCO^+ J=4-3
- The Role of Magnetic Fields in Spiral Galaxies
- Magnetic fields in the Milky Way and other spiral galaxies
- KAT-7 Science Verification: Using HI Observations of NGC 3109 to Understand its Kinematics and Mass Distribution
- Magnetic and gaseous spiral arms in M83
- Neutral hydrogen and magnetic fields in M83 observed with the SKA Pathfinder KAT-7
- CHANG-ES XIX: Galaxy NGC 4013 -- a diffusion-dominated radio halo with plane-parallel disk and vertical halo magnetic fields
- Dissecting the spiral galaxy M83: mid-infrared emission and comparison with other tracers of star formation
- X-ray source population study of the starburst galaxy M83 with XMM-Newton
- Hot gas and magnetic arms of NGC 6946: indications for reconnection heating?