Signatures in a Giant Radio Galaxy of a Cosmological Shock Wave at Intersecting Filaments of Galaxies

• Main Authors: Ensslin, Torsten A, Simon, Patrick, Biermann, Peter L, Klein, Ulrich, Kohle, Sven, Kronberg, Philipp P, Mack, Karl-Heinz
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 19-12-2000
• Subjects: Physics - Astrophysics of Galaxies; Physics - Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics; Physics - Earth and Planetary Astrophysics; Physics - High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena; Physics - Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics; Physics - Solar and Stellar Astrophysics
• DOI: 10.48550/arxiv.astro-ph/0012404

Astrophys.J. 549 (2001) L39-L42 Sensitive images of low-level, Mpc-sized radio cocoons offer new
opportunities to probe large scale intergalactic gas flows outside clusters of
galaxies. New radio images of high surface brightness sensitivity at
strategically chosen wavelengths of the giant radio galaxy NGC 315 (Mack et al.
1997,1998) reveal significant asymmetries and particularities in the
morphology, radio spectrum and polarization of the ejected radio plasma. We
argue that the combination of these signatures provides a sensitive probe of an
environmental shock wave. Analysis of optical redshifts in NGC 315 vicinity
confirms its location to be near, or at a site of large-scale flow collisions
in the 100 Mpc sized Pisces-Perseus Supercluster region. NGC 315 resides at the
intersection of several galaxy filaments, and its radio plasma serves there as
a `weather station' (Burns 1998) probing the flow of the elusive and previously
invisible IGM gas. If our interpretation is correct, this is the first
indication for a shock wave in flows caused by the cosmological large scale
structure formation, which is located in a filament of galaxies. The
possibility that the putative shock wave is a source of gamma-rays and ultra
high energy cosmic rays is briefly discussed.