Confronting 3 Dimensional Time-dependent Jet Simulations with HST Observations

TL;DR

This study uses advanced 3D time-dependent simulations of magnetized protostellar jets to compare with HST optical observations, revealing detailed jet structures and constraining disk wind models.

Contribution

It presents the first detailed comparison between 3D simulations of magnetized disk winds and high-resolution HST jet observations, constraining magnetic field configurations.

Findings

Simulations reproduce observed jet structures and velocities.

Jet widths and rotation are consistent with observations.

Magnetic field models with modest radial variation are favored.

Abstract

We perform state-of-the-art, 3D, time-dependent simulations of magnetized disk winds, carried out to simulation scales of 60 Astronomical Units, in order to confront optical HST observations of protostellar jets. We ``observe'' the optical forbidden line emission produced by shocks within our simulated jets and compare these with actual observations. Our simulations reproduce the rich structure of time varying jets, including jet rotation far from the source, an inner (up to 400 km/s) and outer (less than 100 km/s) component of the jet, and jet widths of up to 20 Astronomical Units in agreement with observed jets. These simulations when compared with the data are able to constrain disk wind models. In particular, models featuring a disk magnetic field with a modest radial spatial variation across the disk are favored.