Simulating the dynamics and non-thermal emission of relativistic magnetised jets I. Dynamics

Understand

We have performed magneto-hydrodynamic simulations of relativistic jets from supermassive blackholes over a few tens of kpc for a range of jet parameters.

• One of the primary aims were to investigate the effect of different MHD instabilities on the jet dynamics and their dependence on the choice of jet parameters.
• We find that two dominant MHD instabilities affect the dynamics of the jet, small scale Kelvin- Helmholtz (KH) modes and large scale kink modes, whose evolution depend on internal jet parameters like the Lorentz factor, the ratio of the density and pressure to the external medium and the magnetisation and hence consequently on the jet power.
• Low power jets are susceptible to both instabilities, kink modes for jets with higher central magnetic field and KH modes for lower magnetisation.