July 28, 2025 to August 1, 2025
Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics
America/Toronto timezone

Kinetic simulations of the cosmic ray pressure anisotropy instability: cosmic ray scattering rate in the saturated state

Not scheduled
10m
PI/1-100 - Theatre (Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics)

PI/1-100 - Theatre

Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics

190
Contributed Talk

Speaker

XIAOCHEN SUN (Princeton University)

Description

Cosmic ray (CR) feedback plays a vital role in shaping the formation and evolution of galaxies through their interaction with magnetohydrodynamic waves. In the CR self-confinement scenario, the waves are generated by the CR gyro-resonant instabilities via CR streaming or CR pressure anisotropy and saturate by balancing wave damping. The resulting effective particle scattering rate by the waves, $\nu_{\text{eff}}$, critically sets the coupling between the CRs and background gas, but the efficiency of CR feedback is yet poorly constrained. We employ 1D kinetic simulations under the Magnetohydrodynamic-Particle-In-Cell (MHD-PIC) framework with the adaptive $\delta f$ method to quantify $\nu_{\text{eff}}$ for the saturated state of the CR pressure anisotropy instability (CRPAI) with ion-neutral friction. We drive CR pressure anisotropy by expanding/compressing box, mimicking the background evolution of magnetic field strength, and the CR pressure anisotropy eventually reaches a quasi-steady state by balancing quasi-linear diffusion. At the saturated state, we measure $\nu_{\text{eff}}$ and the CR pressure anisotropy level, establishing a calibrated scaling relation with environmental parameters. The scaling relation is consistent with quasi-linear theory and can be incorporated to CR fluid models, in either the single-fluid or $p$-by-$p$ treatments. Our results serve as a basis for accurately calibrating the subgrid physics in macroscopic studies of CR feedback and transport.

Authors

XIAOCHEN SUN (Princeton University) Xihui Zhao (Tsinghua University) Xue-Ning Bai (Tsinghua University)

Presentation materials

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