AGN jets do not prevent the suppression of conduction by the heat buoyancy instability in simulated galaxy clusters
Abstract
Centres of galaxy clusters must be efficiently reheated to avoid a cooling catastrophe. One potential reheating mechanism is anisotropic thermal conduction, which could transport thermal energy from intermediate radii to the cluster centre. However, if fields are not re-randomised, anisotropic thermal conduction drives the heat buoyancy instability (HBI) which re-orients magnetic field lines and shuts off radial heat fluxes. We revisit the efficiency of thermal conduction under the influence of spin-driven active galactic nuclei (AGN) jets in idealised magneto-hydrodynamical simulations with anisotropic thermal conduction. Despite the black hole spin's ability to regularly re-orientate the jet so that the jet-induced turbulence is driven in a quasi-isotropic fashion, the HBI remains efficient outside the central 50 kpc of the cluster, where the reservoir of heat is the largest. As a result, conduction plays no significant role in regulating the cooling of the intracluster medium if central AGN are the sole source of turbulence. Whistler-wave-driven saturation of thermal conduction reduces the magnitude of the HBI, but does not prevent it.
- Publication:
-
Astronomy and Astrophysics
- Pub Date:
- October 2022
- DOI:
- arXiv:
- arXiv:2204.12514
- Bibcode:
- 2022A&A...666A..71B
- Keywords:
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- galaxies: clusters: intracluster medium;
- methods: numerical;
- galaxies: magnetic fields;
- instabilities;
- galaxies: jets;
- Astrophysics - Astrophysics of Galaxies;
- Astrophysics - High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena
- E-Print:
- Resubmitted to A&