2004/10/21 by S. Jester, Sebastian Jester, H. -J. Roeser +4 · 4 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Astrophysics and Cosmic Phenomena #Gamma-ray bursts and supernovae #Solar and Space Plasma Dynamics #astro-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1051/0004-6361:20047021
published as Astron.Astrophys. 431 (2005) 477 · 28 pages, lots of figures, accepted for publication in A&A
arxiv created 2004/10/21 · openalex publication_date 2005/02/01 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01
We present deep VLA and HST observations of the large-scale jet in 3C 273 matched to 03 resolution. The observed spectra show a significant flattening in the infrared–ultraviolet wavelength range. The jet's emission cannot therefore be assumed to arise from a single electron population and requires the presence of an additional emission component. The observed smooth variations of the spectral indices along the jet imply that the physical conditions vary correspondingly smoothly. We determine the maximum particle energy for the optical jet using synchrotron spectral fits. The slow decline of the maximum energy along the jet implies particle reacceleration acting along the entire jet. In addition to the already established global anti-correlation between maximum particle energy and surface brightness, we find a weak positive correlation between small-scale variations in maximum particle energy and surface brightness. The origin of these conflicting global and local correlations is unclear, but they provide tight constraints for reacceleration models.