2006/11/04 by Katsuaki Asano, Fumio Takahara · 17 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Annihilation #Astrophysics #Astrophysics and Cosmic Phenomena #Atomic physics #Bhabha scattering #Bremsstrahlung #Compton scattering #Electron #Galaxies: Formation, Evolution, Phenomena #Galaxy #Gamma-ray bursts and supernovae #Luminosity #Monte Carlo method #Nuclear physics #Pair production #Photon #Physics #Plasma #Positron #Quantum mechanics #Radiative cooling #Radiative transfer #Scattering #Thomson scattering #astro-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1086/509756
published in The Astrophysical Journal 655(2), 762-768 (IOP Publishing) · 20 pages, 7figures. accepted for publication in ApJ
arxiv created 2006/11/04 · openalex publication_date 2007/01/23 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Motivated by relativistic jets observed in active galactic nuclei, we simulate outflows of electron-positron pairs strongly coupled with photons from normal electron-proton plasmas. Using multifluid approximation and a Monte Carlo method of radiative transfer, we obtain spherically symmetric, steady solutions of radiation and pair outflows for the luminosity L ≤ 10 47 ergs s -1 . For the microphysics, Coulomb scattering, Compton scattering, bremsstrahlung, and electron-positron pair annihilation and creation are taken into account. Although a significant amount of pairs outflow with a mildly relativistic velocity because of the powerful radiative force, the temperature is not high enough to avoid pair annihilation before the fireball becomes optically thin to scattering. Several caveats in the simulations are also discussed.