A 1D fluid model of the Centaurus A jet
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Date
2018-09-27
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Sarka Wykes, Bradford T Snios, Paul E J Nulsen, Ralph P Kraft, Mark Birkinshaw, Martin J Hardcastle, Diana M Worrall, Iain McDonald, Marina Rejkuba, Thomas W Jones, David J Stark, William R Forman, Eileen T Meyer, Christine Jones, A 1D fluid model of the Centaurus A jet, Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Volume 485, Issue 1, May 2019, Pages 872–888, https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stz348
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This work was written as part of one of the author's official duties as an Employee of the United States Government and is therefore a work of the United States Government. In accordance with 17 U.S.C. 105, no copyright protection is available for such works under U.S. Law.
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This work was written as part of one of the author's official duties as an Employee of the United States Government and is therefore a work of the United States Government. In accordance with 17 U.S.C. 105, no copyright protection is available for such works under U.S. Law.
Public Domain Mark 1.0
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Abstract
We implement a steady, one-dimensional flow model for the X-ray jet of Centaurus A in which entrainment of stellar mass loss is the primary cause of dissipation. Using over 260 ks of new and archival Chandra/ACIS data, we have constrained the temperature, density and pressure distributions of gas in the central regions of the host galaxy of Centaurus A, and so the pressure throughout the length of its jet. The model is constrained by the observed profiles of pressure and jet width, and conserves matter and energy, enabling us to estimate jet velocities, and hence all the other flow properties. Invoking realistic stellar populations within the jet, we find that the increase in its momentum flux exceeds the net pressure force on the jet unless only about one half of the total stellar mass loss is entrained. For self-consistent models, the bulk speed only falls modestly, from ~0.67c to ~0.52c over the range of 0.25-5.94 kpc from the nucleus. The sonic Mach number varies between ~5.3 and 3.6 over this range.