Polarized synchrotron data and the structure of the Galactic magnetic field

TL;DR

This paper analyzes polarized synchrotron data revealing a dominant turbulent magnetic field in the Galactic disk, proposing a three-component GMF model to reconcile observational and cosmic ray propagation data.

Contribution

It introduces a three-component Galactic magnetic field model with varying turbulence levels to resolve conflicting observations and cosmic ray propagation requirements.

Findings

Low polarization fraction (~3%) indicating strong turbulence.

Coherent large-scale magnetic structures observed.

Proposed three-component GMF model with distinct turbulence levels.

Abstract

The polarized synchrotron data of the northern C-BASS survey show a surprisingly low linear polarization fraction, $\Pi\simeq 3\%$, while the magnetic field polarization features coherent structures over rather large angular scales. The low polarization degree points to a strong dominance of the turbulent magnetic field -- in agreement with the observation that the total synchrotron intensity is much larger than expected from the regular component in current models for the Galactic magnetic field (GMF). In contrast, studies of cosmic ray propagation employing these GMF models suggest that cosmic rays propagate anisotropically, what in turn requires weak turbulent fields. As a solution to this contradicting requirements, we suggest that the GMF consists of three components with different levels of turbulence: a disk dominated by the turbulent field, a halo dominated by the regular field, plus an extended turbulent halo field.