Black Hole Gravitohydromagnetics
By: by Brian Punsly
Series: Astronomy and Astrophysics Library; Astronomy and Astrophysics Library
Publisher: Springer Berlin Heidelberg
Published: 2001
Place of publication: Berlin, Heidelberg
Language: eng
Format: [electronic resource] /
Number of pages: 402
ISBN-13: 9783662044117; 9783662044094
Subjects: Physics
Description: A new branch of physics, black hole gravitohydromagnetics (GHM) is developed from the rudiments to the frontiers of research in this book. GHM describes plasma interactions that combine the effects of gravity and a strong magnetic field, in the vicinity (ergosphere) of a rapidly rotating black hole. This topic was created in response to the astrophysical quest to understand the central engines of radio loud extragalactic radio sources. The theory describes a "torsional tug of war" between rotating ergospheric plasma and the distant asymptotic plasma that extracts the rotational inertia of the black hole. The recoil from the struggle between electromagnetic and gravitational forces near the event horizon is manifested as a powerful pair of magnetized particle beams (jets) that are ejected at nearly the speed of light. These bipolar jets feed large-scale magnetized plasmoids on scales as large as millions of light years (the radio lobes of extragalactic radio sources). This interaction can initiate jets that transport energy fluxes exceeding 10*47 ergs/s.
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Table of contents: title: From the Contents: Introduction; title: Relativistic Plasma Physics; title: Particle Trajectories in the Ergosphere; title: Vacuum Electrodynamics; title: Magnetically Dominated Time Stationary Perfect MHD Winds; title: Perfect MHD Winds and Waves in the Ergosphere; title: Ergosphere Driven Winds; title: Ergospheric Disk Dynamos; title: Winds from Event Horizon Magnetospheres; title: NP Black Holes.