Particle Diffusion and Acceleration by Shock Wave in Magnetized Filamentary Turbulence

Abstract

We expand the off-resonant scattering theory for particle diffusion in magnetized current filaments that can be typically compared to astrophysical jets, including active galactic nucleus jets. In a high plasma beta region where the directional bulk flow is a free-energy source for establishing turbulent magnetic fields via current filamentation instabilities, a novel version of quasi-linear theory to describe the diffusion of test particles is proposed. The theory relies on the proviso that the injected energetic particles are not trapped in the small-scale structure of magnetic fields wrapping around and permeating a filament but deflected by the filaments, to open a new regime of the energy hierarchy mediated by a transition compared to the particle injection. The diffusion coefficient derived from a quasi-linear type equation is applied to estimating the timescale for the stochastic acceleration of particles by the shock wave propagating through the jet. The generic scalings of the achievable highest energy of an accelerated ion and electron, as well as of the characteristic time for conceivable energy restrictions, are systematically presented. We also discuss a feasible method of verifying the theoretical predictions. The strong, anisotropic turbulence reflecting cosmic filaments might be the key to the problem of the acceleration mechanism of the highest energy cosmic rays exceeding 100 EeV (10^{20} eV), detected in recent air shower experiments.

39 pages, 2 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ

References in corpus (4)

• A $\lambda$20cm Survey of the Galactic Center Region I: Detection of Numerous Linear Filaments
• Evolution of the polarization of the optical afterglow of the gamma-ray burst GRB 030329
• Filamentary jets as a cosmic-ray "Zevatron"
• Proton acceleration beyond 100 EeV by an oblique shock wave in the jet of 3C 273

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• Jitter Mechanism as a Kind of Coherent Radiation: Constrained by the GRB 221009A Emission at 18 TeV
• Suppression of resistive hose instability in a relativistic electron-positron flow
• Additional Acceleration of Protons and Energetic Neutrino Production in a Filamentary Jet of the Blazar Markarian 501