All Hands on Deck: What observations, theory, simulation and laboratory experiments are teaching us about the powerful AGN jets

Powerful jets from active galactic nuclei (AGNs) are observed on scales from Mpc down to astronomical units, from essentially all observable wavebands and via multi-messengers. These enigmatic sources could hold the key to several long-standing mysteries such as ultra-high energy cosmic rays and more recently the origin of high-energy ~ PeV neutrinos. Understanding such sources has strongly influenced the development of (general) relativistic magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) and kinetic plasma astrophysics, including even laboratory experiments. We present observational and theoretical/numerical modeling results that link the large-scale global morphologies with small-scale particle energization processes. We discuss how the behavior of magnetic fields can shift the framework within which we interpret the AGN jets/lobes. These include their lobe polarization properties, lobe energy composition, Fermi flares and their corresponding optical polarization properties, as well as the efficient particle acceleration by the dissipation of jet magnetic fields, studied via comprehensive multi-dimensional plasma kinetic simulations. Future prospects of progress in simulations, experiments and observations will be discussed as well.

Speaker: Hui Li, Los Alamos National Labs