Particle acceleration and radiation reaction in strong spherical electromagnetic waves
Résumé
Strongly magnetized and fast-rotating neutron stars are known to be efficient particle accelerators within their magnetosphere and wind. They are suspected to accelerate leptons, protons, and maybe ions to extreme relativistic regimes where the radiation reaction significantly feeds back to their motion. In the vicinity of neutron stars, magnetic field strengths are close to the critical value of B_c ∼ 4.4 · 10^9 T and particle Lorentz factors of the order γ ∼ 10^9 are expected. In this paper, we investigate the acceleration and radiation reaction feedback in the pulsar wind zone where a large-amplitude low-frequency electromagnetic wave is launched starting from the light cylinder. We design a semi-analytical code solving exactly the particle equation of motion including radiation reaction in the Landau–Lifshits approximation for a null-like electromagnetic wave of arbitrary strength parameter and elliptical polarization. Under conventional pulsar conditions, asymptotic Lorentz factor as high as 10^8−10^9 is reached at large distances from the neutron star. However, we demonstrate that in the wind zone, within the spherical wave approximation, radiation reaction feedback remains negligible.
Mots clés
neutron -stars
rotation -pulsars
general
methods: analytical
stars: neutron
stars: rotation
pulsars: general
magnetic fields
wave: electromagnetic
particle: acceleration
neutron star: rotation
frequency: low
feedback
Lorentz
pulsar
field equations
magnetic field
field strength
polarization
accelerator
lepton
ion
magnetic fields -methods
analytical -stars
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