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1. GOALS-JWST: Resolving the Circumnuclear Gas Dynamics in NGC 7469 in the Mid-infrared

   https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/ac961c  

   U, Vivian ; Lai, Thomas ; Bianchin, Marina ; Remigio, Raymond P. ; Armus, Lee ; Larson, Kirsten L. ; Díaz-Santos, Tanio ; Evans, Aaron ; Stierwalt, Sabrina ; Law, David R. ; et al ( November 2022 , The Astrophysical Journal Letters)

   The nearby, luminous infrared galaxy NGC 7469 hosts a Seyfert nucleus with a circumnuclear star-forming ring and is thus the ideal local laboratory for investigating the starburst–AGN (active galactic nucleus) connection in detail. We present integral-field observations of the central 1.3 kpc region in NGC 7469 obtained with the JWST Mid-InfraRed Instrument. Molecular and ionized gas distributions and kinematics at a resolution of ∼100 pc over the 4.9–7.6μm region are examined to study the gas dynamics influenced by the central AGN. The low-ionization [Feii]λ5.34μm and [Arii]λ6.99μm lines are bright on the nucleus and in the starburst ring, as opposed to H₂S(5)λ6.91μm, which is strongly peaked at the center and surrounding ISM. The high-ionization [Mgv] line is resolved and shows a broad, blueshifted component associated with the outflow. It has a nearly face-on geometry that is strongly peaked on the nucleus, where it reaches a maximum velocity of −650 km s⁻¹, and extends about 400 pc to the east. Regions of enhanced velocity dispersion in H₂and [Feii] ∼ 180 pc from the AGN that also show highL(H₂)/L(PAH) andL([Feii])/L(Pfα) ratios to the W and N of the nucleus pinpoint regions where the ionized outflow is depositing energy, via shocks, into the dense interstellar medium between the nucleus and the starburst ring. These resolved mid-infrared observations of the nuclear gas dynamics demonstrate the power of JWST and its high-sensitivity integral-field spectroscopic capability to resolve feedback processes around supermassive black holes in the dusty cores of nearby luminous infrared galaxies.

    

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2. An updated glitch rate law inferred from radio pulsars

   https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stac194  

   Millhouse, M. ; Melatos, A. ; Howitt, G. ; Carlin, J. B. ; Dunn, L. ; Ashton, G. ( January 2022 , Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society)

   Radio pulsar glitches probe far-from-equilibrium processes involving stress accumulation and relaxation in neutron star interiors. Previous studies of glitch rates have focused on individual pulsars with as many recorded glitches as possible. In this work, we analyse glitch rates using all available data including objects that have glitched never or once. We assume the glitch rate follows a homogeneous Poisson process, and therefore exclude pulsars that exhibit quasiperiodic glitching behaviour. Calculating relevant Bayes factors shows that a model in which the glitch rate λ scales as a power of the characteristic age τ is preferred over models that depend arbitrarily on powers of the spin frequency ν and/or its time derivative $\dot{\nu }$. For λ = A(τ/τref)−γ, where τref = 1 yr is a reference time, the posterior distributions are unimodal with $A=0.0066_{-0.002}^{+0.003}\ \rm {yr}^{-1}$ and $\gamma =0.27_{-0.03}^{+0.03}$. Importantly, the data exclude with 99 per cent confidence the possibility γ = 1 canvassed in the literature. When objects with zero-recorded glitches are included, the age-based rate law is still preferred and the posteriors change to give $A=0.0099_{-0.003}^{+0.004}\ \rm {yr}^{-1}$ and $\gamma =0.31_{-0.03}^{+0.03}$. The updated estimates still support increased glitch activity for younger pulsars, while demonstrating that the large number of objects with zero glitches contain important statistical information about the rate, provided that they are part of the same population as opposed to a disjoint population which never glitches for some unknown physical reason.

    

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3. Scary Barbie: An Extremely Energetic, Long-duration Tidal Disruption Event Candidate without a Detected Host Galaxy at z = 0.995

   https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/accf1a  

   Subrayan, Bhagya M. ; Milisavljevic, Dan ; Chornock, Ryan ; Margutti, Raffaella ; Alexander, Kate D. ; Ramakrishnan, Vandana ; Duffell, Paul C. ; Dickinson, Danielle A. ; Lee, Kyoung-Soo ; Giannios, Dimitrios ; et al ( May 2023 , The Astrophysical Journal Letters)

   Abstract We report multiwavelength observations and characterization of the ultraluminous transient AT 2021lwx (ZTF20abrbeie; aka “Barbie”) identified in the alert stream of the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) using a Recommender Engine For Intelligent Transient Tracking filter on the ANTARES alert broker. From a spectroscopically measured redshift of 0.995, we estimate a peak-observed pseudo-bolometric luminosity of log( L max / [ erg s − 1 ] ) = 45.7 from slowly fading ztf- g and ztf- r light curves spanning over 1000 observer-frame days. The host galaxy is not detected in archival Pan-STARRS observations ( g > 23.3 mag), implying a lower limit to the outburst amplitude of more than 5 mag relative to the quiescent host galaxy. Optical spectra exhibit strong emission lines with narrow cores from the H Balmer series and ultraviolet semi-forbidden lines of Si iii ] λ 1892, C iii ] λ 1909, and  C ii ] λ 2325. Typical nebular lines in Active Galactic Nucleus (AGN) spectra from ions such as [O ii ] and [O iii ] are not detected. These spectral features, along with the smooth light curve that is unlike most AGN flaring activity and the luminosity that exceeds any observed or theorized supernova, lead us to conclude that AT 2021lwx is most likely an extreme tidal disruption event (TDE). Modeling of ZTF photometry with MOSFiT suggests that the TDE was between a ≈14 M ⊙ star and a supermassive black hole of mass M BH ∼ 10 8 M ⊙ . Continued monitoring of the still-evolving light curve along with deep imaging of the field once AT 2021lwx has faded can test this hypothesis and potentially detect the host galaxy. 

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4. Stranger than metals

   https://doi.org/10.1126/science.abh4273  

   Phillips, Philip W. ; Hussey, Nigel E. ; Abbamonte, Peter ( July 2022 , Science)

   BACKGROUND Landau’s Fermi liquid theory provides the bedrock on which our understanding of metals has developed over the past 65 years. Its basic premise is that the electrons transporting a current can be treated as “quasiparticles”—electron-like particles whose effective mass has been modified, typically through interactions with the atomic lattice and/or other electrons. For a long time, it seemed as though Landau’s theory could account for all the many-body interactions that exist inside a metal, even in the so-called heavy fermion systems whose quasiparticle mass can be up to three orders of magnitude heavier than the electron’s mass. Fermi liquid theory also lay the foundation for the first successful microscopic theory of superconductivity. In the past few decades, a number of new metallic systems have been discovered that violate this paradigm. The violation is most evident in the way that the electrical resistivity changes with temperature or magnetic field. In normal metals in which electrons are the charge carriers, the resistivity increases with increasing temperature but saturates, both at low temperatures (because the quantized lattice vibrations are frozen out) and at high temperatures (because the electron mean free path dips below the smallest scattering pathway defined by the lattice spacing). In “strange metals,” by contrast, no saturation occurs, implying that the quasiparticle description breaks down and electrons are no longer the primary charge carriers. When the particle picture breaks down, no local entity carries the current. ADVANCES A new classification of metallicity is not a purely academic exercise, however, as strange metals tend to be the high-temperature phase of some of the best superconductors available. Understanding high-temperature superconductivity stands as a grand challenge because its resolution is fundamentally rooted in the physics of strong interactions, a regime where electrons no longer move independently. Precisely what new emergent phenomena one obtains from the interactions that drive the electron dynamics above the temperature where they superconduct is one of the most urgent problems in physics, attracting the attention of condensed matter physicists as well as string theorists. One thing is clear in this regime: The particle picture breaks down. As particles and locality are typically related, the strange metal raises the distinct possibility that its resolution must abandon the basic building blocks of quantum theory. We review the experimental and theoretical studies that have shaped our current understanding of the emergent strongly interacting physics realized in a host of strange metals, with a special focus on their poster-child: the copper oxide high-temperature superconductors. Experiments are highlighted that attempt to link the phenomenon of nonsaturating resistivity to parameter-free universal physics. A key experimental observation in such materials is that removing a single electron affects the spectrum at all energy scales, not just the low-energy sector as in a Fermi liquid. It is observations of this sort that reinforce the breakdown of the single-particle concept. On the theoretical side, the modern accounts that borrow from the conjecture that strongly interacting physics is really about gravity are discussed extensively, as they have been the most successful thus far in describing the range of physics displayed by strange metals. The foray into gravity models is not just a pipe dream because in such constructions, no particle interpretation is given to the charge density. As the breakdown of the independent-particle picture is central to the strange metal, the gravity constructions are a natural tool to make progress on this problem. Possible experimental tests of this conjecture are also outlined. OUTLOOK As more strange metals emerge and their physical properties come under the scrutiny of the vast array of experimental probes now at our disposal, their mysteries will be revealed and their commonalities and differences cataloged. In so doing, we should be able to understand the universality of strange metal physics. At the same time, the anomalous nature of their superconducting state will become apparent, offering us hope that a new paradigm of pairing of non-quasiparticles will also be formalized. The correlation between the strength of the linear-in-temperature resistivity in cuprate strange metals and their corresponding superfluid density, as revealed here, certainly hints at a fundamental link between the nature of strange metallicity and superconductivity in the cuprates. And as the gravity-inspired theories mature and overcome the challenge of projecting their powerful mathematical machinery onto the appropriate crystallographic lattice, so too will we hope to build with confidence a complete theory of strange metals as they emerge from the horizon of a black hole. Curved spacetime with a black hole in its interior and the strange metal arising on the boundary. This picture is based on the string theory gauge-gravity duality conjecture by J. Maldacena, which states that some strongly interacting quantum mechanical systems can be studied by replacing them with classical gravity in a spacetime in one higher dimension. The conjecture was made possible by thinking about some of the fundamental components of string theory, namely D-branes (the horseshoe-shaped object terminating on a flat surface in the interior of the spacetime). A key surprise of this conjecture is that aspects of condensed matter systems in which the electrons interact strongly—such as strange metals—can be studied using gravity. 

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5. Oscillation modes of strange quark stars with a strangelet crust

   Asbell, Jessica ; Jaikumar, Prashanth ( April 2017 , Compact Stars in the QCD Phase Diagram V)

   We study the non-radial oscillation modes of strange quark stars with a homogeneous core and a crust made of strangelets. Using a 2-component equation-of-state model (core+crust) for strange quark stars that can produce stars as heavy as 2 solar masses, we identify the high-frequency l=2 spheroidal (f, p) in Newtonian gravity, using the Cowling approximation. The results are compared to the case of homogeneous compact stars such as polytropic neutron stars, as well as bare strange stars. We find that the strangelet crust only increases very slightly the frequency of the spheroidal modes, and that Newtonian gravity overestimates the mode frequencies of the strange star, as is the case for neutron stars. 

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