Non-thermal radiation from collisions of compact objects with intermediate scale jets in active galaxies

TL;DR

This paper explores how collisions between stars, globular clusters, and jets in active galaxies produce shocks that accelerate particles to TeV energies, resulting in detectable non-thermal X-ray and gamma-ray emissions.

Contribution

It introduces a model for non-thermal radiation from star-jet collisions in active galaxies, predicting observable TeV emissions from intermediate scale jets.

Findings

Particles can be accelerated up to multi-TeV energies.

Synchrotron radiation extends up to X-ray energies.

Predicted gamma-ray emission is detectable from nearby active galaxies.

Abstract

Massive black holes in active galaxies are immersed in huge concentrations of late type stars in the galactic bulges and also early type massive stars in the nuclear stellar clusters which are additionally surrounded by quasi-spherical several kpc scale halos containing from a few hundred up to several thousand globular clusters (GCs). It is expected that significant numbers of red giant stars, massive stars and also GCs can move through the jet expelled from the central engine of active galaxy. We consider collisions of stars from the galactic bulge, nuclear cluster and globular clusters with the jet plasma. As a result of such collisions, multiple shocks are expected to appear in the jet around these compact objects. Therefore, the plasma in the kpc scale jet can be significantly disturbed. We show that particles can be accelerated on these shocks up to the multi-TeV energies. TeV leptons emit synchrotron radiation, extending up to the X-ray energies, and also comptonize radiation produced in a stellar cluster and also the Microwave Background Radiation to TeV $\gamma$-ray energies. We show that such non-thermal radiation is likely to be detectable from the intermediate scale jets of the nearby active galaxies for reasonable number of stars and GCs immersed within the jet. As an example, we calculate the expected non-thermal emission in the X-ray and gamma-ray energies from the nearby radio galaxy Cen A from which a steady gamma-ray emission with the complex spectrum has been recently reported by the Fermi and the HESS Observatories.