2018/01/12 by A. Lazarian, Alex Lazarian, Bing Zhang +1 · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · #Astronomy and Astrophysical Research #Astrophysics and Cosmic Phenomena #Gamma-ray burst #Gamma-ray bursts and supernovae #Instability #Magnetic energy #Magnetic field #Magnetic reconnection #Magnetohydrodynamics #Turbulence #astro-ph.HE
paper · pdf · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ab2b38
11 pages, 2 figures, submitted to ApJ
arxiv created 2018/01/12 · openalex created_date 2018/01/26 · openalex publication_date 2019/09/10 · arxiv updated 2019/09/25 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Abstract We revisit the Internal-Collision-induced MAgnetic Reconnection and Turbulence model of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) in view of the advances made in understanding of both relativistic magnetic turbulence and relativistic turbulent magnetic reconnection. We identify the kink instability as the most natural way of changing the magnetic configuration to release the magnetic free energy through magnetic reconnection, as well as driving turbulence that enables fast turbulent reconnection. We show that this double role of the kink instability is important for explaining the prompt emission of GRBs. Our study confirms the critical role that turbulence plays in boosting reconnection efficiency in GRBs and suggests that the GRB phenomena can be modeled in the magnetohydrodynamics approximation. That is, the modeling is not constrained by reproducing the detailed microphysical properties of relativistic magnetized plasmas.