Jet Deflection via Crosswinds: Laboratory Astrophysical Studies

Abstract

We present new data from high energy density laboratory experiments designed to explore the interaction of a heavy hypersonic radiative jet with a crosswind. The jets are generated with the MAGPIE pulsed power machine, where converging conical plasma flows are produced from a cylindrically symmetric array of inclined wires. Radiative hypersonic jets emerge from the convergence point. The crosswind is generated by ablation of a plastic foil via soft X-rays from the plasma convergence region. Our experiments show that the jets are deflected by the action of the crosswind, with the angle of deflection dependent on the proximity of the foil. Shocks within the jet beam are apparent in the data. Analysis of the data shows that the interaction of the jet and crosswind is collisional and therefore in the hydrodynamic regime. MHD plasma code simulations of the experiments are able to recover the deflection behavior seen in the experiments. We consider the astrophysical relevance of these experiments, applying published models of jet deflection developed for active galactic nuclei and young stellar objects. Fitting the observed jet deflections to quadratic trajectories predicted by these models allows us to recover a set of plasma parameters consistent with the data. We also present results of three-dimensional numerical simulations of jet deflection using a new astrophysical adaptive mesh refinement code. These simulations show highly structured shocks occurring within the beam similar to what was observed in the experiments.