Quasar 3C279 was observed with the NASA Fermi-LAT space telescope by astrophysicist Amit Shukla, who until 2018 conducted research at the Julius Maximilian University (JMU) Würzburg in Bavaria, Germany. He now works at the Indian Institute of Technology in Indore. The scientist found that the core of the jet, detected in the millimeter wavelength range, also emits high-energy gamma rays, but with extremely flickering brightness.
The special nature of the sequence of changes in brightness is characteristic of a universal process, magnetic reconnection, which occurs in many astrophysical objects with strong magnetic fields. Solar activity is also associated with magnetic field dynamics and reconnection. This was recently demonstrated by observing “bonfires” in the solar atmosphere with the ESA Solar Orbiter mission.
But back to the quasar 3C279.
During reconnection, energy that was initially stored invisibly in the magnetic field is suddenly released in the form of numerous “mini-jets”. Particles are accelerated in these rays, which then produce the observed gamma rays. Magnetic reconnection could explain how the energy reaches the jet core from the black hole and where it ultimately comes from.
Professor Karl Mannheim, head of the Department of Astronomy at the JMU and co-author of the publication, explains: “Space-time around the black hole in the 3C279 quasar is forced to rotate in corotation (along the radius of synchronous rotation). The magnetic fields attached to the plasma around the black hole expel the jet, slowing down the black hole’s rotation and converting some of its rotational energy into radiation.
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