Far UV excitation of hydrogen and light emission; applications in astrophysics

TL;DR

This paper models the UV-induced ionization and superradiant emission in hydrogen shells around hot sources, explaining observed ring structures in supernova remnants like 1987A.

Contribution

It introduces a new theoretical framework for superradiance and induced scattering in hydrogen shells, linking plasma physics to astrophysical observations.

Findings

Superradiant rings form due to mode competition in hydrogen shells.

Radial and tangential beam brightness tend to equalize thermodynamically.

The model explains the visibility of the source and ring structures in supernova remnants.

Abstract

Assuming a spherical symmetry, the extreme UV emitted by a very hot source ionizes low pressure molecular hydrogen making a transparent bubble of H II (Protons and electrons). For an increase of radius, intensity of extreme UV and temperature decrease, so that the plasma contains more and more atoms. A spherical shell, mainly of neutral atoms (H I) appears. If this shell is optically thick at Lyman frequencies of H I, it is superradiant and a competition of modes selects modes tangent to a sphere for which many atoms are excited. Thus, a shell of plasma emits, into a given direction, tangential rays showing a ring in which selected modes are brighter. While at Lyman frequencies, absorption of rays emitted by the source excites the atoms able to amplify the superradiance, a more powerful amplification of superradiance results from an induced scattering of the radial beams, which extends to feet of lines and progressively to the whole spectrum. Thermodynamics says that the brightness of radial and tangential beams tends to be equal; if the solid angle of observation is much larger for the ring than for the source, almost the whole light emitted by the source is transferred to the rings, and the source becomes invisible. Paradoxically, a glow due to incoherent scattering and impurities around the source remains visible. As the scattering decreases with the decrease of the radial intensity, the brightness of the ring decreases with radius. These characteristics are found in supernova remnant 1987A.