2006/05/20 by Sebastian Jester, S. Jester, D. E. Harris +4
Physics and Astronomy · #Anisotropy #Astronomy #Astrophysical Phenomena and Observations #Astrophysics #Astrophysics and Cosmic Phenomena #Brightness #Compton scattering #Cosmic microwave background #Electron #Galaxies: Formation, Evolution, Phenomena #Galaxy #Jet (fluid) #Nuclear physics #Optics #Particle acceleration #Photon #Physics #Quasar #Radio galaxy #Spectral line #Synchrotron #astro-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1086/505962
published as Astrophys.J.648:900-909,2006 · 11 pages, 5 figures, emulateapj. Accepted by ApJ
arxiv created 2006/05/20 · openalex publication_date 2006/09/08 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/08
The jet in 3C 273 is a high-power quasar jet with radio, optical, and X-ray emission, whose size and brightness allow a detailed study of the emission processes acting in it. We present deep Chandra observations of this jet and analyze the spectral properties of the jet emission from radio through X-rays. We find that the X-ray spectra are significantly softer than the radio spectra in all regions of the bright part of the jet, except for the first bright "knot A," ruling out a model in which the X-ray emission from the entire jet arises from beamed inverse Compton scattering of cosmic microwave background photons in a single-zone jet flow. Within two-zone jet models, we find that a synchrotron origin for the jet's X-rays requires fewer additional assumptions than an inverse Compton model, especially if velocity shear leads to efficient particle acceleration in jet flows.