High velocity clouds interacting with galactic halo plasma as a source of X-ray emission

Kellett, B.J. and Bingham, R. (2005) High velocity clouds interacting with galactic halo plasma as a source of X-ray emission. Journal of Plasma Physics, 71 (2). pp. 111-118. ISSN 0022-3778 (https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022377804003502)

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Abstract

Several high velocity clouds (HVCs) are now known to be soft X-ray sources. In this paper we suggest that all interaction between the HVCs and the galactic halo is leading to plasma instabilities that generate energetic electrons which in turn generate X-ray emission. This process is essentially analogous to the interaction process between cornets and non-magnetized planets with the solar wind which is also known to lead to the generation of X-rays. We show that for reasonable assumptions about the galactic halo magnetic field, the X-ray emission can be converted into an estimate of the mean galactic halo density it the position of the cloud. This provides a method for estimating the baryonic mass of the plasma halo provided that we call obtain a good estimate for the distance to the HVC.

  • Item type:Article
    ID code:31210
    Dates:
    Date
    Event
    1 April 2005
    Published
    Subjects:Science > Physics
    Department:Faculty of Science > Physics
    Depositing user: Pure Administrator
    Date deposited:13 Jul 2011 08:55
    Last modified:08 Apr 2024 19:07
    URI:https://strathprints.strath.ac.uk/id/eprint/31210
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