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PRODID:UW-Madison-Physics-Events
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SEQUENCE:0
UID:UW-Physics-Event-1035
DTSTART:20080219T214500Z
DURATION:PT1H0M0S
DTSTAMP:20260409T030628Z
LAST-MODIFIED:19700101T060000Z
LOCATION:6515 Sterling Hall (coffee at 3:30 pm in 6521 Sterling)
SUMMARY:Illuminating the Glowing Magnetospheres of Massive\, Luminous 
 Stars\, Astronomy Colloquium\, Richard Townsend\, University of Delawa
 re- Bartol Research Institute
DESCRIPTION:Massive\, luminous stars are not expected to harbor magnet
 ic fields\, owing to their lack of envelope convection zones and assoc
 iated field-generating dynamos. Puzzlingly\, however\, it has been kno
 wn since the 1970s that a small yet growing subset of massive stars po
 ssess strong\, global-scale fields. These fields channel and confine t
 he stars' supersonic\, radioactively driven winds\, leading to the for
 mation of glowing\, co-rotating magnetospheres that can be observed ac
 ross the electromagnetic spectrum\, from X-rays through to radio.My in
 terest in massive-star magnetospheres stems from the challenge of unde
 rstanding the rich variety of phenomena they manifest\, at a detailed\
 , quantitative level. In my presentation\, I aim to illuminate the bas
 ic physical processes responsible for the existence of these magnetosp
 heres. Then\, with the aid of extensive animations\, I willintroduce t
 he new 'Rigidly Rotating Magnetosphere' and 'Rigid Field Hydrodynamics
 ' models that I have developed for understanding magnetospheric signat
 ures at optical\, UV and X-ray wavelengths.
URL:https://www.physics.wisc.edu/events/?id=1035
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