@article{LiuLiuXuetal.2013, author = {Liu, Rui and Liu, Chang and Xu, Yan and Liu, Wei and Kliem, Bernhard and Wang, Haimin}, title = {Observation of a moretown wave and wave-filament interactions associated with the renowned X9 flare on 1990 May 24}, series = {The astrophysical journal : an international review of spectroscopy and astronomical physics}, volume = {773}, journal = {The astrophysical journal : an international review of spectroscopy and astronomical physics}, number = {2}, publisher = {IOP Publ. Ltd.}, address = {Bristol}, issn = {0004-637X}, doi = {10.1088/0004-637X/773/2/166}, pages = {13}, year = {2013}, abstract = {Using Big Bear Solar Observatory film data recently digitized at NJIT, we investigate a Moreton wave associated with an X9 flare on 1990 May 24, as well as its interactions with four filaments F1-F4 located close to the flaring region. The interaction yields interesting insight into physical properties of both the wave and the filaments. The first clear Moreton wavefront appears at the flaring-region periphery at approximately the same time as the peak of a microwave burst and the first of two gamma-ray peaks. The wavefront propagates at different speeds ranging from 1500-2600 km s(-1) in different directions, reaching as far as 600 Mm away from the flaring site. Sequential chromospheric brightenings are observed ahead of the Moreton wavefront. A slower diffuse front at 300-600 km s(-1) is observed to trail the fast Moreton wavefront about one minute after the onset. The Moreton wave decelerates to similar to 550 km s(-1) as it sweeps through F1. The wave passage results in F1's oscillation which is featured by similar to 1 mHz signals with coherent Fourier phases over the filament, the activation of F3 and F4 followed by gradual recovery, but no disturbance in F2. Different height and magnetic environment together may account for the distinct responses of the filaments to the wave passage. The wavefront bulges at F4, whose spine is oriented perpendicular to the upcoming wavefront. The deformation of the wavefront is suggested to be due to both the forward inclination of the wavefront and the enhancement of the local Alfven speed within the filament channel.}, language = {en} } @article{VafinSchlickeiserYoon2016, author = {Vafin, Sergei and Schlickeiser, R. and Yoon, P. H.}, title = {AMPLIFICATION OF COLLECTIVE MAGNETIC FLUCTUATIONS IN MAGNETIZED BI-MAXWELLIAN PLASMAS FOR PARALLEL WAVE VECTORS. I. ELECTRON-PROTON PLASMA}, series = {The astrophysical journal : an international review of spectroscopy and astronomical physics}, volume = {829}, journal = {The astrophysical journal : an international review of spectroscopy and astronomical physics}, publisher = {IOP Publ. Ltd.}, address = {Bristol}, issn = {0004-637X}, doi = {10.3847/0004-637X/829/1/41}, pages = {8}, year = {2016}, abstract = {The general electromagnetic fluctuation theory is a powerful tool to analyze the magnetic fluctuation spectrum of a plasma. Recent works utilizing this theory for a magnetized non-relativistic isotropic Maxwellian electron-proton plasma have demonstrated that the equilibrium ratio of vertical bar delta B vertical bar/B-0 can be as high as 10(-12). This value results from the balance between spontaneous emission of fluctuations and their damping, and it is considerably smaller than the observed value vertical bar delta B vertical bar/B-0 in the solar wind at 1 au, where 10(-3) less than or similar to vertical bar delta B vertical bar/B-0 less than or similar to 10(-1). In the present manuscript, we consider an anisotropic bi-Maxwellian distribution function to investigate the effect of plasma instabilities on the magnetic field fluctuations. We demonstrate that these instabilities strongly amplify the magnetic field fluctuations and provide a sufficient mechanism to explain the observed value of vertical bar delta B vertical bar/B-0 in the solar wind at 1 au.}, language = {en} } @article{ThomasFeldmeier2016, author = {Thomas, Timon and Feldmeier, Achim}, title = {Radiative waves in stellar winds with line scattering}, series = {Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society}, volume = {460}, journal = {Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society}, publisher = {Oxford Univ. Press}, address = {Oxford}, issn = {0035-8711}, doi = {10.1093/mnras/stw1008}, pages = {1923 -- 1933}, year = {2016}, abstract = {Photospheric radiation can drive winds from hot, massive stars by direct momentum transfer through scattering in bound-bound transitions of atmospheric ions. The line radiation force should cause a new radiative wave mode. The dispersion relation from perturbations of the line force was analysed so far either in Sobolev approximation or for pure line absorption. The former does not include the line-driven instability, and the latter cannot account for upstream propagating, radiative waves. We consider a non-Sobolev line force that includes scattering in a simplified way, accounting however for the important line-drag effect. We derive a new dispersion relation for radiative waves, and analyse wave propagation using Fourier methods, and by numerical solution of an integro-differential equation. The existence of an upstream propagating, dispersive radiative wave mode is demonstrated.}, language = {en} } @article{VafinRiazantsevaYoon2017, author = {Vafin, Sergei and Riazantseva, M. and Yoon, P. H.}, title = {Kinetic Features in the Ion Flux Spectrum}, series = {The astrophysical journal : an international review of spectroscopy and astronomical physics}, volume = {850}, journal = {The astrophysical journal : an international review of spectroscopy and astronomical physics}, publisher = {IOP Publ. Ltd.}, address = {Bristol}, issn = {0004-637X}, doi = {10.3847/1538-4357/aa9519}, pages = {7}, year = {2017}, abstract = {An interesting feature of solar wind fluctuations is the occasional presence of a well-pronounced peak near the spectral knee. These peaks are well investigated in the context of magnetic field fluctuations in the magnetosheath and they are typically related to kinetic plasma instabilities. Recently, similar peaks were observed in the spectrum of ion flux fluctuations of the solar wind and magnetosheath. In this paper, we propose a simple analytical model to describe such peaks in the ion flux spectrum based on the linear theory of plasma fluctuations. We compare our predictions with a sample observation in the solar wind. For the given observation, the peak requires similar to 10 minutes to grow up to the observed level that agrees with the quasi-linear relaxation time. Moreover, our model well reproduces the form of the measured peak in the ion flux spectrum. The observed lifetime of the peak is about 50 minutes, which is relatively close to the nonlinear Landau damping time of 30-40 minutes. Overall, our model proposes a plausible scenario explaining the observation.}, language = {en} } @article{RamiaramanantsoaRatnasingamShenaretal.2018, author = {Ramiaramanantsoa, Tahina and Ratnasingam, Rathish and Shenar, Tomer and Moffat, Anthony F. J. and Rogers, Tamara M. and Popowicz, Adam and Kuschnig, Rainer and Pigulski, Andrzej and Handler, Gerald and Wade, Gregg A. and Zwintz, Konstanze and Weiss, Werner W.}, title = {A BRITE view on the massive O-type supergiant V973 Scorpii}, series = {Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society}, volume = {480}, journal = {Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society}, number = {1}, publisher = {Oxford Univ. Press}, address = {Oxford}, issn = {0035-8711}, doi = {10.1093/mnras/sty1897}, pages = {972 -- 986}, year = {2018}, abstract = {Stochastically triggered photospheric light variations reaching similar to 40 mmag peak-to-valley amplitudes have been detected in the O8 Iaf supergiant V973 Scorpii as the outcome of 2 months of high-precision time-resolved photometric observations with the BRIght Target Explorer (BRITE) nanosatellites. The amplitude spectrum of the time series photometry exhibits a pronounced broad bump in the low-frequency regime (less than or similar to 0.9 d(-1)) where several prominent frequencies are detected. A time-frequency analysis of the observations reveals typical mode lifetimes of the order of 5-10 d. The overall features of the observed brightness amplitude spectrum of V973 Sco match well with those extrapolated from two-dimensional hydrodynamical simulations of convectively driven internal gravity waves randomly excited from deep in the convective cores of massive stars. An alternative or additional possible source of excitation from a sub-surface convection zone needs to be explored in future theoretical investigations.}, language = {en} } @article{VafinLazarFichtneretal.2018, author = {Vafin, Sergei and Lazar, M. and Fichtner, H. and Schlickeiser, R. and Drillisch, M.}, title = {Solar wind temperature anisotropy constraints from streaming instabilities}, series = {Astronomy and astrophysics : an international weekly journal}, volume = {613}, journal = {Astronomy and astrophysics : an international weekly journal}, publisher = {EDP Sciences}, address = {Les Ulis}, issn = {1432-0746}, doi = {10.1051/0004-6361/201731852}, pages = {5}, year = {2018}, abstract = {Due to the relatively low rate of particle-particle collisions in the solar wind, kinetic instabilities (e.g., the mirror and firehose) play an important role in regulating large deviations from temperature isotropy. These instabilities operate in the high beta(parallel to) > 1 plasmas, and cannot explain the other limits of the temperature anisotropy reported by observations in the low beta beta(parallel to) < 1 regimes. However, the instability conditions are drastically modified in the presence of streaming (or counterstreaming) components, which are ubiquitous in space plasmas. These effects have been analyzed for the solar wind conditions in a large interval of heliospheric distances, 0.3-2.5 AU. It was found that proton counter-streams are much more crucial for plasma stability than electron ones. Moreover, new instability thresholds can potentially explain all observed bounds on the temperature anisotropy, and also the level of differential streaming in the solar wind.}, language = {en} } @article{VafinRafighiPohletal.2018, author = {Vafin, Sergei and Rafighi, Iman and Pohl, Martin and Niemiec, Jacek}, title = {The Electrostatic Instability for Realistic Pair Distributions in Blazar/EBL Cascades}, series = {The astrophysical journal : an international review of spectroscopy and astronomical physics}, volume = {857}, journal = {The astrophysical journal : an international review of spectroscopy and astronomical physics}, number = {1}, publisher = {IOP Publ. Ltd.}, address = {Bristol}, issn = {0004-637X}, doi = {10.3847/1538-4357/aab552}, pages = {12}, year = {2018}, abstract = {This work revisits the electrostatic instability for blazar-induced pair beams propagating through the intergalactic medium (IGM) using linear analysis and PIC simulations. We study the impact of the realistic distribution function of pairs resulting from the interaction of high-energy gamma-rays with the extragalactic background light. We present analytical and numerical calculations of the linear growth rate of the instability for the arbitrary orientation of wave vectors. Our results explicitly demonstrate that the finite angular spread of the beam dramatically affects the growth rate of the waves, leading to the fastest growth for wave vectors quasi-parallel to the beam direction and a growth rate at oblique directions that is only a factor of 2-4 smaller compared to the maximum. To study the nonlinear beam relaxation, we performed PIC simulations that take into account a realistic wide-energy distribution of beam particles. The parameters of the simulated beam-plasma system provide an adequate physical picture that can be extrapolated to realistic blazar-induced pairs. In our simulations, the beam looses only 1\% of its energy, and we analytically estimate that the beam would lose its total energy over about 100 simulation times. An analytical scaling is then used to extrapolate the parameters of realistic blazar-induced pair beams. We find that they can dissipate their energy slightly faster by the electrostatic instability than through inverse-Compton scattering. The uncertainties arising from, e.g., details of the primary gamma-ray spectrum are too large to make firm statements for individual blazars, and an analysis based on their specific properties is required.}, language = {en} } @article{VafinDekaPohletal.2019, author = {Vafin, Sergei and Deka, Pranab Jyoti and Pohl, Martin and Bohdan, Artem}, title = {Revisit of Nonlinear Landau Damping for Electrostatic Instability Driven by Blazar-induced Pair Beams}, series = {The astrophysical journal : an international review of spectroscopy and astronomical physics}, volume = {873}, journal = {The astrophysical journal : an international review of spectroscopy and astronomical physics}, number = {1}, publisher = {IOP Publ. Ltd.}, address = {Bristol}, issn = {0004-637X}, doi = {10.3847/1538-4357/ab017b}, pages = {12}, year = {2019}, abstract = {We revisit the effect of nonlinear Landau (NL) damping on the electrostatic instability of blazar-induced pair beams, using a realistic pair-beam distribution. We employ a simplified 2D model in k-space to study the evolution of the electric-field spectrum and to calculate the relaxation time of the beam. We demonstrate that the 2D model is an adequate representation of the 3D physics. We find that nonlinear Landau damping, once it operates efficiently, transports essentially the entire wave energy to small wave numbers where wave driving is weak or absent. The relaxation time also strongly depends on the intergalactic medium temperature, T-IGM, and for T-IGM << 10 eV, and in the absence of any other damping mechanism, the relaxation time of the pair beam is longer than the inverse Compton (IC) scattering time. The weak late-time beam energy losses arise from the accumulation of wave energy at small k, that nonlinearly drains the wave energy at the resonant k of the pair-beam instability. Any other dissipation process operating at small k would reduce that wave-energy drain and hence lead to stronger pair-beam energy losses. As an example, collisions reduce the relaxation time by an order of magnitude, although their rate is very small. Other nonlinear processes, such as the modulation instability, could provide additional damping of the nonresonant waves and dramatically reduce the relaxation time of the pair beam. An accurate description of the spectral evolution of the electrostatic waves is crucial for calculating the relaxation time of the pair beam.}, language = {en} } @phdthesis{Alawashra2024, author = {Alawashra, Mahmoud}, title = {Plasma instabilities of TeV pair beams induced by blazars}, doi = {10.25932/publishup-63013}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-630131}, school = {Universit{\"a}t Potsdam}, pages = {xxi, 130}, year = {2024}, abstract = {Relativistic pair beams produced in the cosmic voids by TeV gamma rays from blazars are expected to produce a detectable GeV-scale cascade emission missing in the observations. The suppression of this secondary cascade implies either the deflection of the pair beam by intergalactic magnetic fields (IGMFs) or an energy loss of the beam due to the electrostatic beam-plasma instability. IGMF of femto-Gauss strength is sufficient to significantly deflect the pair beams reducing the flux of secondary cascade below the observational limits. A similar flux reduction may result in the absence of the IGMF from the beam energy loss by the instability before the inverse Compton cooling. This dissertation consists of two studies about the instability role in the evolution of blazar-induced beams. Firstly, we investigated the effect of sub-fG level IGMF on the beam energy loss by the instability. Considering IGMF with correlation lengths smaller than a few kpc, we found that such fields increase the transverse momentum of the pair beam particles, dramatically reducing the linear growth rate of the electrostatic instability and hence the energy-loss rate of the pair beam. Our results show that the IGMF eliminates beam plasma instability as an effective energy-loss agent at a field strength three orders of magnitude below that needed to suppress the secondary cascade emission by magnetic deflection. For intermediate-strength IGMF, we do not know a viable process to explain the observed absence of GeV-scale cascade emission and hence can be excluded. Secondly, we probed how the beam-plasma instability feeds back on the beam, using a realistic two-dimensional beam distribution. We found that the instability broadens the beam opening angles significantly without any significant energy loss, thus confirming a recent feedback study on a simplified one-dimensional beam distribution. However, narrowing diffusion feedback of the beam particles with Lorentz factors less than 1e6 might become relevant even though initially it is negligible. Finally, when considering the continuous creation of TeV pairs, we found that the beam distribution and the wave spectrum reach a new quasi-steady state, in which the scattering of beam particles persists and the beam opening angle may increase by a factor of hundreds. This new intrinsic scattering of the cascade can result in time delays of around ten years, thus potentially mimicking the IGMF deflection. Understanding the implications on the GeV cascade emission requires accounting for inverse Compton cooling and simulating the beam-plasma system at different points in the IGM.}, language = {en} }