Radio emission from RS CVn binary systems
The RS CVn binary stellar systems UX Ari, HR 1099, AR Lac, HR 5110, II Peg, lambda And, and SZ Psc were investigated by use of radio interferometry during the period from July 1982 through August 1983. Interferometry took two forms: Very Large Array (VLA) observations and Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI). The VLA observations determined the characteristic polarization and flux behavior of the centimeter wavelength radio emission. The observed spectral index was near zero during quiescent periods, rising to between 0.5 and 1.0 during active periods. No net linear polarization is observed to a limit of 1.7%. This is expected since the Faraday depth of thermal electrons deduced from x-ray observations is approx. 10/sup 5/. Circular polarization is observed to be less than 20% at all frequencies often with a helicity reversal between 1.6 GHz and 5 GHz. The VLBI observations have shown that the brightness temperatures are often T/sub B/ approx.> 10/sup 10/ /sup 0/K and size sources smaller than or comparable to the overall size of the binary system. These data are consistent with incoherent gyrosynchrotron emission from mildly relativistic electrons which are optically thick to their own radiation at 1.6 GHz and optically thin at 5 GHz and above. The spectral behavior suggests that the radio emission is due to a power-law distribution of electrons.
- Research Organization:
- Iowa Univ., Iowa City (USA)
- OSTI ID:
- 5823493
- Resource Relation:
- Other Information: Thesis (Ph. D.)
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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