Related papers: Dissipation in intercluster plasma
The distribution of metals and temperature in the intracluster medium (ICM) provides key insights into galaxy cluster evolution, revealing information about chemical enrichment and heating and cooling processes, respectively. To access this…
Magnetic nozzles are a key component of electrodeless plasma thrusters, acting as their main acceleration stage. Non-stationary phenomena common to the entire range of $E \times B$ devices, such as oscillations and instabilities, are likely…
The microphysics of the intracluster medium (ICM) in galaxy clusters is still poorly understood. Observational evidence suggests that the effective viscosity is suppressed by plasma instabilities that reduce the mean free path of particles.…
We present a theoretical framework for plasma turbulence in astrophysical plasmas (solar wind, interstellar medium, galaxy clusters, accretion disks). The key assumptions are that the turbulence is anisotropic with respect to the mean…
In weakly collisional astrophysical plasmas, such as the intracluster medium of galaxy clusters, the amplification of cosmic magnetic fields by chaotic fluid motions is hampered by the adiabatic production of magnetic-field-aligned pressure…
We develop a theory of buoyancy instabilities of the electron-ion plasma with the heat flux based on not the MHD equations, but using the multicomponent plasma approach. We investigate a geometry in which the background magnetic field,…
Astrophysical plasmas are typically magnetized, with the Larmor radii of the charged particles many orders of magnitude smaller than their collisional mean free paths. The fundamental properties of such plasmas, e.g., conduction and…
It is shown that the transport in low temperature, collisional, bounded plasma is enhanced by instabilities at high magnetic field. While the magnetic field confines the electrons in a stable plasma, the instability completely destroys the…
The relationship between a decaying strong turbulence and kinetic instabilities in a slowly expanding plasma is investigated using two-dimensional (2-D) hybrid expanding box simulations. We impose an initial ambient magnetic field…
We consider the problem of self-regulated heating and cooling in galaxy clusters and the implications for cluster magnetic fields and turbulence. Viscous heating of a weakly collisional magnetised plasma is regulated by the pressure…
In a collisionless, magnetized plasma, particles may stream freely along magnetic-field lines, leading to phase "mixing" of their distribution function and consequently to smoothing out of any "compressive" fluctuations (of density,…
Collisionless plasmas exhibit nonthermal particle distributions after being energized; as a consequence, they enter a state of low Boltzmann-Gibbs (BG) entropy relative to the thermal state. The Vlasov equations predict that in a…
A relativistic electron-positron pair beam can be produced in the interaction of TeV photons from a blazar with the extragalactic background light (EBL). The relativistic $e^{\pm}$ pairs would loss energy through inverse-Compton scattering…
In the intracluster medium (ICM) of galaxies, exchanges of heat across magnetic field lines are strongly suppressed. This anisotropic heat conduction, in the presence of a large-scale temperature gradient, destabilizes the outskirts of…
This white paper, submitted for the Plasma 2020 Decadal Survey, concerns the physics of weakly collisional, high-beta plasmas -- plasmas in which the thermal pressure dominates over the magnetic pressure and in which the inter-particle…
The assumption of a spatially uniform helium distribution in the intracluster medium can lead to biases in the estimates of key cluster parameters if composition gradients are present. The helium concentration profile in galaxy clusters is…
We conduct two kinds of homogeneous isotropic turbulence simulations relevant for the intracluster medium (ICM): (i) pure turbulence runs without radiative cooling; (ii) turbulent heating$+$radiative cooling runs with global thermal…
For plasma velocity space instabilities driven by particle distributions significantly deviated from a Maxwellian, weak collisions can damp the instabilities by an amount that is significantly beyond the collisional rate itself. This is…
Cluster galaxies moving through the intracluster medium (ICM) are expected to lose some of their interstellar medium (ISM) through ISM-ICM interactions. We perform high resolution (40 pc) three-dimensional hydrodynamical simulations of a…
Additional physics beyond standard hydrodynamics is needed to fully model the intracluster medium (ICM); however, as we move to more sophisticated models, it is important to consider the role of magnetic fields and the way the fluid…