External Confinement and Surface Modes in Magnetised Force-Free Jets

TL;DR

This paper investigates how external confinement in magnetised force-free jets can excite surface modes that contribute to energy conversion from magnetic to kinetic form, especially relevant for AGN jets.

Contribution

It demonstrates that external pressure confinement can induce surface instabilities affecting jet dynamics, a novel insight into jet stability and energy transfer mechanisms.

Findings

Surface modes develop after tens to hundreds of jet radii.

External confinement can significantly influence jet stability.

Surface instabilities may facilitate Poynting flux conversion in AGN jets.

Abstract

In the paradigm of magnetic launching of astrophysical jets, instabilities in the MHD flow are a good candidate to convert the Poynting flux into the kinetic energy of the plasma. If the magnetised plasma fills the almost entire space, the jet is unstable to helical perturbations of its body. However, the growth rate of these modes is suppressed when the poloidal component of the magnetic field has a vanishing gradient, which may be the actual case for a realistic configuration. Here we show that, if the magnetised plasma is confined into a limited region by the pressure of some external medium, the velocity shear at the contact surface excites unstable modes which can affect a significant fraction of the jet's body. We find that when the Lorentz factor of the jet is $\Gamma\sim10$ ($\Gamma\sim 100$), these perturbations typically develop after propagating along the jet for tens (hundreds) of jet's radii. Surface modes may therefore play an important role in converting the energy of the jet from the Poynting flux to the kinetic energy of the plasma, particularly in AGN. The scaling of the dispersion relation with (i) the angular velocity of the field lines and (ii) the sound speed in the confining gas is discussed.