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Physics Astrophysics

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Sunday 2 November

Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics

Massive neutrinos and interacting dark matter look alike through the lens of lensing

We demonstrate that the suppression in the lensing power spectrum of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) caused by massive neutrinos can be mimicked by dark matter-baryon interactions at the precision of next-generation CMB experiments. Thus, a determination of neutrino masses from the CMB lensing power spectrum may be compromised. We illustrate the degeneracy for a dark matter-proton cross section $\propto v^{-4}$, which arises in the $t$-channel exchange of an ultralight mediator in the nonrelativistic limit.
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Astrophysics of Galaxies

A sensitivity analysis of interstellar ice chemistry in astrochemical models

Astrochemical models are essential to bridge the gap between the timescales of reactions, experiments, and observations. Ice chemistry in these models experiences a large computational complexity as a result of the many parameters required for the modeling of chemistry occurring on these ices, such as binding energies and reaction energy barriers. Many of these parameters are poorly constrained, and accurately determining all would be too costly. We aim to find out which parameters describing ice chemistry have a large effect on the calculated abundances of ices for different prestellar objects. Using Monte Carlo sampled binding energies, diffusion barriers, desorption and diffusion prefactors, and reaction energy barriers, we determined the sensitivity of the abundances of the main ice species calculated with UCLCHEM, an astrochemical modeling code, on each of these parameters. We do this for a large grid of physical conditions across temperature, density, cosmic ray ionization rate and UV field strength. We find that, regardless of the physical conditions, the main sensitivities of abundances of the main ice species are the diffusion barriers of small and relatively mobile reactive species such as H, N, O, HCO, and CH$_3$. Thus, these parameters should be determined more accurately to increase the accuracy of models, paving the way to a better understanding of observations of ices. In many cases, accurate reaction energy barriers are not essential due to the treatment of competition between reactions and diffusion.
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All authors Tobias M. Dijkhuis, Thanja Lamberts, Serena Viti, Herma M. Cuppen

Astrophysics of Galaxies

The Atacama Cosmology Telescope: stellar mass growth in massive galaxy clusters from DR5 over the past 7 billion years

We probe the stellar mass growth in a sample of 568 Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (SZ) selected galaxy clusters with masses greater than $2.9 \times 10^{14} \mathrm{M_{\odot}}$ and redshifts in the range $0.2 < z < 0.8$, drawn from the fifth data release of the Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT DR5). By utilising deep photometry from the tenth data release of the Dark Energy Camera Legacy Survey (DECaLS DR10), we construct redshift- and cluster mass-binned composite cluster stellar mass functions (SMFs), down to $M_* = 10^{9.5} \mathrm{M_{\odot}}$. This work presents the first analysis of the cluster SMF for this cluster sample at this epoch. We find that the characteristic stellar mass ($M^*$) of the cluster SMF evolves marginally from $0.55 \leq z < 0.8$, with most of the measurable growth occurring at $ 0.2 < z < 0.55$. This suggests that most of the massive galaxy population in clusters ($M_* \gtrsim 10^{10.75} \mathrm{M_{\odot}}$) is largely established by $z \sim 0.8$, with subsequent evolution driven by late-time assembly processes. The low-mass slope ($\alpha$) of the composite cluster SMF is flat at high-$z$ ($z \sim 0.8$) but steepens at $z < 0.55$, suggesting an abundance of massive galaxies in high-$z$ clusters compared to low-$z$ clusters. We measure the evolution of cluster stellar mass fractions contained within galaxies with $M_* > 10^{9.5} \mathrm{M_{\odot}}$ between $ 0.2 < z < 0.8$, and find evidence of significant growth, by a factor of $2.5$, after accounting for the growth in cluster halo mass over this epoch.
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All authors Damien C. Ragavan, Unnikrishnan Sureshkumar, Matt Hilton, John P. Hughes, Kavilan Moodley, Tony Mroczkowski, Bruce Partridge, Maria Salatino, Cristóbal Sifón, Eve M. Vavagiakis, Edward J. Wollack

Solar and Stellar Astrophysics

Lu and Hamilton model for solar flares over a rewiring complex network

We present a modified Lu & Hamilton-type model where the neighborhood relations are replaced by topological connections, which can be dynamically altered. The model represents each grid node as a flux tube, as in the classic model, but with connections evolving to capture the complex effects of magnetic reconnection. Through this framework, we analyze how the dissipated energy distribution changes, particularly focusing on the power-law exponent $\alpha_E$, which decreases with respect to the original model due to rewiring effects. When the system is dominated by rewiring, it presents an exponential distribution exponent $\beta_E$, showing a faster decay of dissipated energy than in the original model. This leads to microflare-dominated dynamics at short timescales, causing the system to lose the scale-free behavior observed in both the original model (Lu & Hamilton 1991) and in configurations where energy release is primarily driven by forcing rather than rewiring. Our results reveal a clear transition from power-law to exponential regimes as the rewiring probability increases, fundamentally altering the energy distribution characteristics of the system. In contrast, when considering topological neighbors instead of local ones, the model's dynamics become intrinsically nonlocal. This leads to scaling exponents comparable to those reported in other nonlocal dynamical systems.
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All authors Alejandro Zamorano, Laura Morales, Denisse Pastén, Víctor Muñoz

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics

Onset of habitable conditions on the Hadean Earth set by feedback between tides and greenhouse forcing

In the aftermath of the Moon-forming giant impact, the Hadean Earth's mantle and surface crystallized from a global magma ocean blanketed by a dense volatile-rich atmosphere. While prior studies have explored the thermal evolution of such early Earth scenarios under idealized, oxidizing conditions, the potential feedback between tidal heating driven by Earth–Moon orbital forcing and variable redox scenarios have not yet been explored in detail. We investigate whether tidal heating could have prolonged this early magma ocean phase and supported quasi-steady state epochs of global radiative equilibrium: periods of thermal balance between outgoing radiation and interior heat flux. Using the $\texttt{PROTEUS}$ simulation framework, we simulate Earth's early evolution under a range of plausible tidal power densities, oxygen fugacities, and volatile inventories. Our results suggest that feedback between tidal heating and atmospheric forcing can induce substantial variation in magma ocean lifetimes, from $\sim$30 Myr up to $\sim$500 Myr, sensitive to interior redox conditions. Global radiative equilibrium epochs commonly arise across this range, lasting from $\sim$2 to $\sim$320 Myr, and typically occur from 24 Myr after the Moon-forming impact. Under oxidizing conditions, late-stage H$_2$O degassing promotes melt retention and sustained heating due to its significant contribution to greenhouse forcing. Weak tides increase the atmospheric abundance of H$_2$S and NH$_3$ and deplete CO. Therefore, the feedback between tides and atmospheric forcing induces a disequilibrium signature in the magma ocean atmosphere.
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High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena

Search for GeV-scale Dark Matter from the Galactic Center with IceCube-DeepCore

Models describing dark matter as a novel particle often predict that its annihilation or decay into Standard Model particles could produce a detectable neutrino flux in regions of high dark matter density, such as the Galactic Center. In this work, we search for these neutrinos using $\sim$9 years of IceCube-DeepCore data with an event selection optimized for energies between 15 GeV to 200 GeV. We considered several annihilation and decay channels and dark matter masses ranging from 15 GeV up to 8 TeV. No significant deviation from the background expectation from atmospheric neutrinos and muons was found. The most significant result was found for a dark matter mass of 201.6 GeV annihilating into a pair of $b\bar{b}$ quarks assuming the Navarro-Frenk-White halo profile with a post-trial significance of $1.08 \;\sigma$. We present upper limits on the thermally-averaged annihilation cross-section of the order of $10^{-24}~\mathrm{cm}^3 \mathrm{s}^{-1}$, as well as lower limits on the dark matter decay lifetime up to $10^{26}~\mathrm{s}$ for dark matter masses between 5 GeV up to 8 TeV. These results strengthen the current IceCube limits on dark matter masses above 20 GeV and provide an order of magnitude improvement at lower masses. In addition, they represent the strongest constraints from any neutrino telescope on GeV-scale dark matter and are among the world-leading limits for several dark matter scenarios.
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All authors The IceCube Collaboration: R. Abbasi, M. Ackermann, J. Adams, S. K. Agarwalla, J. A. Aguilar, M. Ahlers, J.M. Alameddine, S. Ali, N. M. Amin, K. Andeen, C. Argüelles, Y. Ashida, S. Athanasiadou, S. N. Axani, R. Babu, X. Bai, J. Baines-Holmes, A. Balagopal V., S. W. Barwick, S. Bash, V. Basu, R. Bay, J. J. Beatty, J. Becker Tjus, P. Behrens, J. Beise, C. Bellenghi, B. Benkel, S. BenZvi, D. Berley, E. Bernardini, D. Z. Besson, E. Blaufuss, L. Bloom, S. Blot, I. Bodo, F. Bontempo, J. Y. Book Motzkin, C. Boscolo Meneguolo, S. Böser, O. Botner, J. Böttcher, J. Braun, B. Brinson, Z. Brisson-Tsavoussis, R. T. Burley, D. Butterfield, M. A. Campana, K. Carloni, J. Carpio, S. Chattopadhyay, N. Chau, Z. Chen, D. Chirkin, S. Choi, B. A. Clark, A. Coleman, P. Coleman, G. H. Collin, D. A. Coloma Borja, A. Connolly, J. M. Conrad, D. F. Cowen, C. De Clercq, J. J. DeLaunay, D. Delgado, T. Delmeulle, S. Deng, P. Desiati, K. D. de Vries, G. de Wasseige, T. DeYoung, J. C. Díaz-Vélez, S. DiKerby, T. Ding, M. Dittmer, A. Domi, L. Draper, L. Dueser, D. Durnford, K. Dutta, M. A. DuVernois, T. Ehrhardt, L. Eidenschink, A. Eimer, C. Eldridge, P. Eller, E. Ellinger, D. Elsässer, R. Engel, H. Erpenbeck, W. Esmail, S. Eulig, J. Evans, P. A. Evenson, K. L. Fan, K. Fang, K. Farrag, A. R. Fazely, A. Fedynitch, N. Feigl, C. Finley, L. Fischer, D. Fox, A. Franckowiak, S. Fukami, P. Fürst, J. Gallagher, E. Ganster, A. Garcia, M. Garcia, G. Garg, E. Genton, L. Gerhardt, A. Ghadimi, T. Glüsenkamp, J. G. Gonzalez, S. Goswami, A. Granados, D. Grant, S. J. Gray, S. Griffin, S. Griswold, K. M. Groth, D. Guevel, C. Günther, P. Gutjahr, C. Ha, C. Haack, A. Hallgren, L. Halve, F. Halzen, L. Hamacher, M. Ha Minh, M. Handt, K. Hanson, J. Hardin, A. A. Harnisch, P. Hatch, A. Haungs, J. Häußler, K. Helbing, J. Hellrung, B. Henke, L. Hennig, F. Henningsen, L. Heuermann, R. Hewett, N. Heyer, S. Hickford, A. Hidvegi, C. Hill, G. C. Hill, R. Hmaid, K. D. Hoffman, D. Hooper, S. Hori, K. Hoshina, M. Hostert, W. Hou, M. Hrywniak, T. Huber, K. Hultqvist, K. Hymon, A. Ishihara, W. Iwakiri, M. Jacquart, S. Jain, O. Janik, M. Jansson, M. Jeong, M. Jin, N. Kamp, D. Kang, W. Kang, A. Kappes, L. Kardum, T. Karg, M. Karl, A. Karle, A. Katil, M. Kauer, J. L. Kelley, M. Khanal, A. Khatee Zathul, A. Kheirandish, H. Kimku, J. Kiryluk, C. Klein, S. R. Klein, Y. Kobayashi, A. Kochocki, R. Koirala, H. Kolanoski, T. Kontrimas, L. Köpke, C. Kopper, D. J. Koskinen, P. Koundal, M. Kowalski, T. Kozynets, A. Kravka, N. Krieger, J. Krishnamoorthi, T. Krishnan, K. Kruiswijk, E. Krupczak, A. Kumar, E. Kun, N. Kurahashi, N. Lad, C. Lagunas Gualda, L. Lallement Arnaud, M. J. Larson, F. Lauber, J. P. Lazar, K. Leonard DeHolton, A. Leszczyńska, C. Li, J. Liao, C. Lin, Q. R. Liu, Y. T. Liu, M. Liubarska, C. Love, L. Lu, F. Lucarelli, W. Luszczak, Y. Lyu, M. Macdonald, J. Madsen, E. Magnus, Y. Makino, E. Manao, S. Mancina, A. Mand, I. C. Mariş, S. Marka, Z. Marka, L. Marten, I. Martinez-Soler, R. Maruyama, J. Mauro, F. Mayhew, F. McNally, J. V. Mead, K. Meagher, S. Mechbal, A. Medina, M. Meier, Y. Merckx, L. Merten, J. Mitchell, L. Molchany, S. Mondal, T. Montaruli, R. W. Moore, Y. Morii, A. Mosbrugger, M. Moulai, D. Mousadi, E. Moyaux, T. Mukherjee, R. Naab, M. Nakos, U. Naumann, J. Necker, L. Neste, M. Neumann, H. Niederhausen, M. U. Nisa, K. Noda, A. Noell, A. Novikov, A. Obertacke, V. O'Dell, A. Olivas, R. Orsoe, J. Osborn, E. O'Sullivan, V. Palusova, H. Pandya, A. Parenti, N. Park, V. Parrish, E. N. Paudel, L. Paul, C. Pérez de los Heros, T. Pernice, T. C. Petersen, J. Peterson, M. Plum, A. Pontén, V. Poojyam, Y. Popovych, M. Prado Rodriguez, B. Pries, R. Procter-Murphy, G. T. Przybylski, L. Pyras, C. Raab, J. Rack-Helleis, N. Rad, M. Ravn, K. Rawlins, Z. Rechav, A. Rehman, I. Reistroffer, E. Resconi, S. Reusch, C. D. Rho, W. Rhode, L. Ricca, B. Riedel, A. Rifaie, E. J. Roberts, M. Rongen, A. Rosted, C. Rott, T. Ruhe, L. Ruohan, D. Ryckbosch, J. Saffer, D. Salazar-Gallegos, P. Sampathkumar, A. Sandrock, G. Sanger-Johnson, M. Santander, S. Sarkar, M. Scarnera, P. Schaile, M. Schaufel, H. Schieler, S. Schindler, L. Schlickmann, B. Schlüter, F. Schlüter, N. Schmeisser, T. Schmidt, F. G. Schröder, L. Schumacher, S. Schwirn, S. Sclafani, D. Seckel, L. Seen, M. Seikh, S. Seunarine, P. A. Sevle Myhr, R. Shah, S. Shah, S. Shefali, N. Shimizu, B. Skrzypek, R. Snihur, J. Soedingrekso, A. Søgaard, D. Soldin, P. Soldin, G. Sommani, C. Spannfellner, G. M. Spiczak, C. Spiering, J. Stachurska, M. Stamatikos, T. Stanev, T. Stezelberger, T. Stürwald, T. Stuttard, G. W. Sullivan, I. Taboada, S. Ter-Antonyan, A. Terliuk, A. Thakuri, M. Thiesmeyer, W. G. Thompson, J. Thwaites, S. Tilav, K. Tollefson, S. Toscano, D. Tosi, A. Trettin, A. K. Upadhyay, K. Upshaw, A. Vaidyanathan, N. Valtonen-Mattila, J. Valverde, J. Vandenbroucke, T. Van Eeden, N. van Eijndhoven, L. Van Rootselaar, J. van Santen, J. Vara, F. Varsi, M. Venugopal, M. Vereecken, S. Vergara Carrasco, S. Verpoest, D. Veske, A. Vijai, J. Villarreal, C. Walck, A. Wang, E. H. S. Warrick, C. Weaver, P. Weigel, A. Weindl, J. Weldert, A. Y. Wen, C. Wendt, J. Werthebach, M. Weyrauch, N. Whitehorn, C. H. Wiebusch, D. R. Williams, L. Witthaus, M. Wolf, G. Wrede, X. W. Xu, J. P. Yanez, Y. Yao, E. Yildizci, S. Yoshida, R. Young, F. Yu, S. Yu, T. Yuan, S. Yun-Cárcamo, A. Zander Jurowitzki, A. Zegarelli, S. Zhang, Z. Zhang, P. Zhelnin, P. Zilberman

Astrophysics of Galaxies

Outside-In Evolution with a Twist: Metallicity Gradients and Asymmetries in the SMC

Taking advantage of the near-infrared calcium triplet lines, we determine metallicities for a sample of more than 3,500 red giant stars in the field of the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC). We find a median metallicity of [Fe/H]=-1.05$\pm$0.01 dex with a negative metallicity gradient of -0.064$\pm$0.007 dex deg$^{-1}$ between 1.2\deg~to 6.0\deg consistent with an outside-in evolution scenario. For the first time, we detect hints of a positive metallicity gradient within 1.2\deg, likely reflecting radial migration or centralised chemical enrichment. Azimuthal metallicity asymmetries are detected, with flatter gradients in the eastern and southern quadrants and steeper ones in the north and west. They are consistent with tidal interaction effects from the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). Finally, in spite of a clear distance and velocity bifurcations in the east, they seem to share a common chemical origin, in agreement with other studies.
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All authors M. Navabi, R. Carrera, N. E. D. Noël, M. De Leo

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics

Gaia and IRTF abundance of A-type main belt asteroids

The Missing Mantle Problem refers to the apparent scarcity of olivine rich (A-type) asteroids in the main belt, despite expectations that such bodies should be common if differentiated parent bodies were widely disrupted. Conversely, A-types appear relatively more abundant among near-Earth asteroids. We present a revised estimate of the A-type abundance in the main belt by combining Gaia Data Release 3 (DR3) reflectance spectra with near-infrared observations from NASA IRTF. We applied principal component analysis (PCA) to Gaia DR3 visible spectra to identify A-type candidates and confirmed a subset through IRTF spectroscopy. Using these data and literature results, we derived the A-type probability distribution as a function of DR3 principal components, and from this, estimated their abundance across heliocentric distances and collisional families. We find that A-types constitute (2.00 +/- 0.15)% of main-belt asteroids significantly higher than previous estimates. Some families, such as Vesta and Flora, show enhanced A-type fractions, while others (e.g. Themis, Hygiea) contain few or none. The elevated abundance in the Flora family supports the existence of an additional differentiated parent body in the inner belt, besides Vesta. These findings indicate that olivine-rich material is more widespread than previously thought, offering new constraints on the Missing Mantle Problem and on early Solar System differentiation processes.
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All authors Marco Delbo, Chrysa Avdellidou, Marjorie Galinier, Ullas Bhat, Thomas Dyer, Bryce T. Bolin, Laurent Galluccio

Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics · Cross-listed from gr-qc

Reconstruction of Black Hole Ringdown Signals with Data Gaps using a Deep-Learning Framework

We introduce DenoiseGapFiller (DGF), a deep-learning framework specifically designed to reconstruct gravitational-wave ringdown signals corrupted by data gaps and instrumental noise. DGF employs a dual-branch encoder-decoder architecture, which is fused via mixing layers and Transformer-style blocks. Trained end-to-end on synthetic ringdown waveforms with gaps up to 20% of the segment length, DGF can achieve a mean waveform mismatch of 0.002. The residual amplitudes of the Time-domain shrink by roughly an order of magnitude and the power spectral density in the 0.01-1 Hz band is suppressed by 1-2 orders of magnitude, restoring the peak of quasi-normal mode(QNM) in the time-frequency representation around 0.01-0.1 Hz. The ability of the model to faithfully reconstruct the original signals, which implies milder penalties in the detection evidence and tighter credible regions for parameter estimation, lay a foundation for the following scientific work.
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All authors Jing-Qi Lai, Jia-Geng Jiao, Cai-Ying Shao, Jun-Xi Shi, Yu Tian

Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics

The CatWISE2020 Quasar dipole: A Reassessment of the Cosmic Dipole Anomaly

The Ellis-Baldwin test probes the cosmological principle by comparing the kinematic Cosmic Microwave Background dipole with the Doppler-driven dipole in the number counts of extragalactic radio sources. Recent analysis of the CatWISE2020 quasar catalog reported a number-count dipole amplitude exceeding the kinematic expectation at $4.9\sigma$ significance. We present a comprehensive reassessment of this test using the same dataset, incorporating major sources of uncertainty in the statistical inference. We employ a simulation framework based on the FLASK package, using lognormal realizations of the large-scale structure, quasar clustering bias, the survey's radial selection function, and its exact sky coverage. Our simulations account for the kinematic dipole, the intrinsic clustering dipole, shot noise, and survey geometry effects. The analysis yields a revised significance of $3.63\sigma$ in the absence of a clustering dipole, and $3.44\sigma$ with a randomly oriented clustering dipole. When the clustering dipole is aligned with the kinematic dipole, the significance decreases further to $3.27\sigma$. Although the anomaly is reduced, it cannot be explained solely by the clustering dipole or mode coupling from the survey mask. We further assess dipole measurement robustness by fitting models with successively higher-order multipoles up to $\ell = 4$. Partial sky coverage induces mode coupling, shifting the dipole estimate to higher values when the octopole is included and inflating its variance as additional modes are incorporated, reflected in the increasing condition number of the estimator. This behavior highlights a bias-variance trade-off inherent in multipole fitting on partial-sky data.
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Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics

Limits of self-interacting neutrinos from the BAO and CMB phase shift

Neutrinos with Standard Model interactions free-stream in the early Universe, leaving a distinct phase shift in the pattern of baryon acoustic oscillations (BAO). When isolated, this phase shift allows one to robustly infer the presence of the cosmic neutrino background in BAO and cosmic microwave background (CMB) data independently of other cosmological parameters. While in the context of the Standard Model, this phase shift follows a known scale-dependent relation, new physics in the cosmic neutrino background could alter the overall shape of this feature. In this paper, we discuss how changes in the neutrino phase shift could be used to constrain self-interactions among neutrinos. We produce simple models for this phase-shift assuming universal self-interactions, and use these in order to understand what constraining power is available for the strength of such interactions in BAO and CMB data. We find that, although challenging, it may be possible to use a detection of the phase to put a more robust limit on the strength of the self-interaction, $G_{\mathrm{eff}}$, which at present suffers from bimodality in cosmological constraints. Our forecast analysis reveals that BAO data alone will not provide the precision needed to tightly constrain self-interactions; however, the combined analysis of the phase shift signature in both CMB and BAO can potentially provide a way to detect the impact of new neutrino interactions. Our results could be extended upon for models with non-universal interactions.
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All authors Abbé M. Whitford, Cullan Howlett, Tamara M. Davis, David Camarena, Francis-Yan Cyr-Racine

Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics

Generating all-sky radio continuum clustering simulations with GHOST

Techniques using multiple tracers of the large scale structure of the universe show great promise for examining the fundamentals of our Universe's cosmology. Such techniques rely on the different relationship between the overdensity of tracers and the broader matter overdensity, enabling cosmic-variance-free tests of primordial non-Gaussianity in the initial curvature perturbations. There is a great opportunity for current and future all-sky extra-galactic radio surveys to make use of this technique to test for non-Gaussianity at a precision greater than existing all-sky constraints from the cosmic microwave background. To realize this goal there is a need for accurate simulations. Previous radio galaxy simulations have either been realistic but covering only a small area (and so unhelpful for cosmological forecasts), or all-sky dark matter only cosmological simulations but having no connection to a real radio galaxy population. In this study, we use the FLAMINGO suite of cosmological surveys, as well as the matching of dark matter halos to radio galaxy population, to create an accurate sky simulation in order to examine the feasibility of multi-tracer techniques. We present an analysis of the clustering (with a bias model for the simulation), as well as redshift distributions, source counts and radio luminosity functions, and discuss future work on non-Gaussianity detection.
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All authors Brandon Venville, Anna Bonaldi, David Parkinson, Natasha Hurley-Walker, Tim Galvin, Nick Seymour

Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics

A cosmographic analysis using DESI-DR2 and strong lensing: II. Distance Ratio measurements

The distance ratios derived from strong lensing systems, combined with complementary cosmological observations, allow for the study of cosmic expansion and curvature without assuming a fixed background cosmological model. In this work, we perform an analysis of cosmic expansion using the latest Type Ia supernova samples, including PantheonPlus, Union3, and DES Y5, combined with baryon acoustic oscillation dataset from DESI DR2 and strong-lensing distance ratios. The cosmic expansion is carried out to fourth order in the variable $y = z/(1+z)$, which allows constraints on the present-day deceleration, jerk, and snap parameters $(q_0, j_0, s_0)$. The analysis utilizes the distance sum rule to provide an independent determination of the spatial curvature parameter $\Omega_{k0}$ without assuming any specific cosmological dynamics. Our results from combining strong lensing distance ratios with each supernova dataset indicate that a flat Universe remains consistent at the 95% confidence level, and the inclusion of DESI-DR2 measurements tightens the parameter intervals while preserving agreement with flat geometry at the 68% confidence level, in line with standard cosmology. The inferred values of $q_0$ and $j_0$ are compatible with $\Lambda$CDM predictions for all dataset combinations. The constraints on $s_0$ remain weak, although modest improvement appears after DESI DR2 data are included. This work represents the second and final paper in the two-part cosmography study.
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Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics

A cosmographic analysis using DESI-DR2 and strong lensing: I. Time-Delay measurements

Strong gravitational lensing time-delay measurements, together with the distance sum rule (DSR), offer a model-independent approach to probe the geometry and expansion of the universe without relying on a fiducial cosmological model. In this work, we perform a cosmographic analysis by combining the latest Type Ia supernova datasets (PantheonPlus, DESY5, and Union3), baryon acoustic oscillation data from DESI-DR2, and updated time-delay distances from strong lensing systems. The analyses using SGL with individual SNIa datasets (SGL+PantheonPlus, SGL+DESY5, and SGL+Union3) indicate a preference for an open universe, though they remain consistent with spatially flat universe at the $95%$ confidence level. When DESI-DR2 data is included in each combination, the constraints tighten and shift slightly toward a closed universe, while flatness remains supported at the $68%$ confidence level. The best-fit values of $q_0$ and $j_0$ agree with $\Lambda$CDM expectations within $95%$ or $99%$ confidence depending on the dataset, whereas $s_0$ remains weakly constrained in all cases. This work is the first in a series of two companion papers on cosmography with DESI-DR2 and strong lensing.
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Saturday 1 November

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena

Optimal strategies for continuous wave detection in pulsar timing arrays: Realistic pulsar noise and a gravitational wave background

Pulsar timing arrays are sensitive to low-frequency gravitational waves (GWs), such as those produced by supermassive binary black holes at subparsec separations. The incoherent superposition of GWs emitted by a cosmological population of these sources produces a gravitational wave background (GWB), while some individual sources may be resolvable as deterministic signals with slowly varying GW frequencies, which are often referred to as "continuous waves" (CWs). The Fp-statistic is a frequentist method of detecting these CWs. In this paper, we study how the presence of pulsar red noise and a GWB affect the Fp-statistic. We compare results when marginalizing over the red noise and using the maximum-likelihood values of the red noise, and find little difference between the two. We also present results of using the Fp-statistic to analyze the NANOGrav 12.5-year data set, where we find no evidence for CWs in agreement with the previously published Bayesian results.
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All authors Shashwat C. Sardesai, Gabriel E. Freedman, Sarah J. Vigeland, Caitlin A. Witt

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena

Cavitation instability in unmagnetized relativistic pair shocks

We investigate the formation of plasma cavities in unmagnetized relativistic pair shocks and demonstrate that these cavities emerge naturally as a nonlinear consequence of asymmetric Weibel instability. We provide an intuitive physical picture and a minimal fluid model that captures the essential features of this cavitation instability and compare them with PIC results. This mechanism may provide the missing link between kinetic Weibel turbulence and macroscopic magnetic fields in astrophysical shocks.
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Earth and Planetary Astrophysics

Secondary eclipses of two brown dwarfs in the K2 fields: detection by multiple dataset merging

By using various data sources for the stellar fluxes in overlapping campaign fields and employing full time series modeling, we report the detection of the secondary eclipses of two brown dwarfs (CWW 89Ab = EPIC 219388192b and HSHJ 430b = EPIC 211946007b). The detections yielded timings in agreement with the orbital elements derived from the earlier radial velocity measurements and eclipse depths of 70+/-12 ppm (CWW 89Ab) and 852+/-123 ppm (HSHJ 430b). While the high depth in the Kepler waveband for HSHJ 430b is in agreement with the assumption that the emitted flux comes mostly from the internal heat source and the absorbed stellar irradiation, the case of CWW 89Ab suggests very high albedo, because of the lack of sufficient thermal radiation in the Kepler waveband. Assuming completely reflective dayside hemisphere, without circulation, the maximum value of the eclipse depth due to the reflection of the stellar light is 56 ppm. By making the extreme assumption that the true eclipse depth is 3 sigma less than the observed depth, the minimum geometric albedo becomes ~0.6.
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Astrophysics of Galaxies

The Flocculent Structure of the Inner Milky Way Disk

Observations of HI published in 1957 by Westerhout and Schmidt were presented as showing a global face-on view of spiral structure in the Milky Way. Since then many studies have attempted to improve on the early map, perhaps presupposing our Galaxy to be characterized by a Grand-design pattern of prominent spiral arms. We consider here two approaches to explore the nature of spiral structure of the inner Milky Way disk using the HI4PI survey. The first is to search for shallow shoulders in the high-velocity wings of HI data along the Galactic equatorial disk of the inner Milky Way that would be expected if the lines of sight swept across interarm regions of low HI density. The second is to look for broad dips in the integrated HI brightness temperature over the high-velocity wings, pertaining to gas near the subcentral region, that would be expected for the interarm region of a Grand-design. We find neither shallow shoulders nor broad dips in either the Northern quadrant I or the Southern quadrant IV indicating that the Milky Way seen interior to the Solar orbit is not characterized by a majestic spiral-structure Grand-design; this conclusion is a robust one, in that it does not depend on measures of distance. Taken together with decades of work on the bits and pieces of the quite disorganized shambles of the inner Galaxy, we suggest that the Milky Way belongs to the category of Flocculent spirals.
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Solar and Stellar Astrophysics

Polarization Diagnostics Applied to Coronal Mass Ejections and the Background Solar Wind

The ratio of radially to tangentially polarized Thomson-scattered white light provides a powerful tool for locating the 3D position of compact structures in the solar corona and inner heliosphere, and the Polarimeter to Unify the Corona and Heliosphere (PUNCH) has been designed to take full advantage of this diagnostic capability. Interestingly, this same observable that establishes the position of transient blob-like structures becomes a local measure of the slope of the global falloff of density in the background solar wind. It is thus important to characterize the extent along the line of sight of structures being studied, in order to determine whether they are sufficiently compact for 3D positioning. In this paper, we build from analyses of individual lines of sight to three-dimensional models of coronal mass ejections (CMEs), allowing us to consider how accurately polarization properties of the transient and quiescent solar wind are diagnosed. In this way, we demonstrate the challenges and opportunities presented by PUNCH polarization data for various quantitative diagnostics.
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All authors Sarah E Gibson, Craig E. DeForest, Curt A. de Koning, Steven R. Cranmer, Yuhong Fan, Huw Morgan, Elena Provornikova, Anna Malanushenko, David Webb

Astrophysics of Galaxies

The JWST EXCELS Survey: gas-phase metallicity evolution at 2 < z < 8

We present an analysis of the gas-phase mass-metallicity relationship (MZR) and fundamental metallicity relationship (FMR) for $65$ star-forming galaxies at $2 < z < 8$ from the JWST/EXCELS survey. We calculate gas-phase metallicities (12 + log(O/H)) using strong-line calibrations explicitly tested against the EXCELS sample, and report direct-method metallicities for $19$ galaxies. Our sample spans $8.1<\log(\rm M_\star/M_\odot)<10.3$ and $0<\log(\rm SFR/M_\odot \, yr^{-1})<2$, consistent with main-sequence star-forming galaxies at the same redshifts. We find a clear MZR at both $2<z<4$ ($\langle z \rangle = 3.2$) and $4<z<8$ ($\langle z \rangle = 5.5$), with consistent slopes and mild evolution in normalization of $\simeq 0.1 \, \mathrm{dex}$, matching trends from simulations and recent observations. Our results demonstrate rapid gas-phase enrichment in the early Universe; galaxies at $z \simeq 3$ (within the first $\simeq 15$ per cent of cosmic time) are enriched to $\simeq 40$ per cent of the metallicity of equivalent mass galaxies at $z=0$. We find tentative evidence for SFR-dependence in the MZR scatter, though results remain inconclusive and highlight the need for larger high-redshift samples. Comparison with locally derived FMRs reveals a clear offset consistent with other $z > 3$ studies. We discuss potential drivers of this offset, noting that high-redshift samples have significantly different physical properties compared to local samples used to define the $z=0$ FMR. Our results confirm that low-mass, high specific star-formation rate galaxies common at high redshift are inconsistent with the equilibrium conditions underlying the local FMR, and highlight the rapid chemical enrichment at early cosmic epochs.
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All authors T. M. Stanton, F. Cullen, A. C. Carnall, D. Scholte, K. Z. Arellano-Córdova, A. E. Shapley, D. J. McLeod, C. T. Donnan, R. Begley, R. Davé, J. S. Dunlop, R. J. McLure, K. Rowlands, C. Bondestam, M. L. Hamadouche, H.-H. Leung, S. D. Stevenson, E. Taylor

Solar and Stellar Astrophysics

Observational signatures of outside-in accretion bursts in embedded protostars

Optical and infrared surveys have detected increasing numbers of disc accretion outbursts in young stars. Some models of these FU Ori-type events predict that the outburst should start at near- to mid-infrared wavelengths before an optical rise is detected, and this lag between infrared and optical bursts has been observed in at least two systems. Detecting and characterizing infrared precursors can constrain the outburst trigger region, and thus help identify the mechanism producing the outburst. However, because FU Ori objects are generally young and usually embedded in dusty protostellar envelopes, it is not clear whether or how well such infrared precursors can be detected in the presence of strong envelope extinction. To explore this question, we combine time-dependent outburst models of the inner disc with an outer dusty disc and protostellar envelope, and calculate the resulting spectral energy distributions (SEDs) using the radiative transfer code RADMC3D. We find that, for envelope mass infall rates about 10^{-5} Msun/yr (rc/30 au)^{-1/2}, where rc is a characteristic inner radius for the infalling envelope, the infrared precursor is only apparent in the SED when viewed along the outflow cavity. At other inclinations, the precursor is most easily distinguished at infall rates of 10^{-6} Msun/yr (rc/30 au)^{-1/2}. We also show that far-IR and submm/mm monitoring can enable the indirect detection of precursor evolution long before the optical outburst, emphasizing the potential of long-wavelength monitoring for studying the earliest stages of protostar formation.
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Astrophysics of Galaxies

Nonthermal Pressures: Key to Energy Balance and Structure Formation Near Sgr A* in the Milky Way

The circumnuclear region of the Galactic Center offers a unique laboratory to study energy balance and structure formation around Sgr A$\star$. This work investigates thermal and nonthermal processes within 7 pc distance from Sgr A$\star$. Using MeerKAT 1.3 GHz radio continuum data and ALMA H40 radio recombination line emission from the ACES survey, we separate free-free and synchrotron components at $\sim$0.2 pc resolution. With a thermal fraction of $\simeq$13%, the 1.3 GHz emission shows tight correlations with the Herschel PACS infrared data. The correlation between the equipartition magnetic field and molecular gas traced by JCMT $^{12}$CO (J=3$\rightarrow$2) observations reveals a balance between the magnetic field, cosmic rays, and molecular gas pressures south of the circumnuclear disk on $\sim$0.7 pc scales. Unlike the magnetic field and ionized gas, the molecular gas density declines in the cavity (R$\leq$2 pc) toward the center, likely due to feedback from Sgr A$\star$. We find that nonthermal pressure from turbulent gas nearly balances magnetic and cosmic ray pressures and exceeds thermal pressure by two orders of magnitude. The medium surrounding Sgr A$\star$ is filled by a low-$\beta$ (thermal-to-magnetic energy), supersonic plasma, with an Alfvén Mach number $\simeq$ 4 (assuming equipartition). Analysis of the mass-to-magnetic flux ratio suggests that the circumnuclear region is mostly subcritical and, therefore, the magnetic field can help stabilize gas clouds against gravitational collapse.
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All authors Farideh Mazoochi, Fatemeh S. Tabatabaei, Ashley T. Barnes, Laura Colzi, Pablo García, Christian Henkel, Yue Hu, Steven N. Longmore, Sergio Martín, Álvaro Sánchez-Monge, Víctor M. Rivilla, Anika Schmiedeke, Juergen Ott, Daniel L. Walke, Q. Daniel Wang, Gwenllian M. Williams, Suinan Zhang

Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics

Modeling dust dynamics in OpenGadget3 – I. SPH implementation of the One-Fluid model

Dust dynamics plays a critical role in astrophysical processes and has been modeled in hydrodynamical simulations using various approaches. Among particle-based methods like Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH), the One-Fluid model has proven to be highly effective for simulating gas-dust mixtures. This study presents the implementation of the One-Fluid model in OpenGadget3, introducing improvements to the original formulation. These enhancements include time-dependent artificial viscosity and conductivity, as well as a novel treatment of dust diffusion using a pressure-like term. The improved model is tested using a suite of dust dynamics benchmark problems: DUSTYBOX, DUSTYWAVE, and DUSTYSHOCK, with the latter extended to multidimensional scenarios, as well as a dusty Sedov-Taylor blast wave. Additional tests include simulations of Cold Keplerian Disks, dusty protoplanetary disks, and Kelvin-Helmholtz instabilities to evaluate the model's robustness in more complex flows. The implementation successfully passes all standard benchmark tests. It demonstrates stability and accuracy in both simple and complex simulations. The new diffusion term improves the handling of flows with large dust-to-gas ratios and low drag coefficients, although limitations of the One-Fluid model in these regimes remain. The enhanced One-Fluid model is a reliable and robust tool for simulating dust dynamics in OpenGadget3. While it retains some limitations inherent to the original formulation, the introduced improvements expand its applicability and address some challenges in gas-dust dynamics.
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All authors Giovanni Tedeschi-Prades, Til Birnstiel, Klaus Dolag, Barbara Ercolano, Mark Hutchison

Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics

ATCAT: Astronomical Timeseries CAusal Transformer

The Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) at the Vera C. Rubin Observatory will capture light curves (LCs) for 10 billion sources and produce millions of transient candidates per night, necessitating scalable, accurate, and efficient classification. To prepare the community for this scale of data, the Extended LSST Astronomical Time-Series Classification Challenge (ELAsTiCC) sought to simulate a diversity of LSST-like time-domain events. Using a small transformer-based model and refined light curve encoding logic, we present a new state of the art classification performance on ELAsTiCC, with 71.8% F1 on LC-only classifications, and 89.8% F1 on LC+metadata classifications. Previous state of the art was 65.5% F1 for LC-only, and for LC+metadata, 84% F1 with a different setup and 83.5% F1 with a directly comparable setup. Our model outperforms previous state-of-the-art models for fine-grained early detection at all time cutoffs, which should help prioritize candidate transients for follow-up observations. We demonstrate label-efficient training by removing labels from 90% of the training data (chosen uniformly at random), and compensate by leveraging regularization, bootstrap ensembling, and unsupervised pretraining. Even with only 10% of the labeled data, we achieve 67.4% F1 on LC-only and 87.1% F1 on LC+metadata, validating an approach that should help mitigate synthetic and observational data drift, and improve classification on tasks with less labeled data. We find that our base model is poorly calibrated via reliability diagrams, and correct it at a minimal cost to overall performance, enabling selections by classification precision. Finally, our GPU-optimized implementation is 9x faster than other state-of-the-art ELAsTiCC models, and can run inference at ~33000 LCs/s on a consumer-grade GPU, making it suitable for large-scale applications, and less expensive to train.
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Solar and Stellar Astrophysics

Stellar Loci. IX. Estimation of Stellar Parameters from CSST-like Photometry

The China Space Station Telescope (CSST) will conduct a deep and wide imaging survey in the NUV-, u-, g-, r-, i-, z-, and y-bands. In this work, using theoretical data synthesized from the BOSZ spectra of Bohlin et al. (2017), along with observational data constructed from different sources, we present two methods for estimating stellar parameters from CSST-like photometry. One approach is to estimate metallicity [M/H] and surface gravity log g simultaneously by using the metallicity- and log g-dependent stellar loci. Tests with theoretical data (without photometric errors) result in precisions of 0.088 dex and 0.083 dex for [M/H] and log g, respectively. With 0.01 mag photometric errors, precision is degraded by about a factor of two, due to degeneracy in [M/H] and log g. Tests with observational data, although with larger photometric errors, result in precisions of 0.10 dex and 0.39 dex for [Fe/H] and log g, respectively, thanks to the strong correlation between stellar colors and log g in real data. The other approach is the giant-dwarf loci method to obtain classifications and metallicity estimates. With the same observational data, it achieves a better [Fe/H] precision of 0.084 dex, due to the stronger constraints imposed on log g. The method also performs well in distinguishing giants from dwarfs, particularly for red or metal-poor giants. This work demonstrates the clear potential of the CSST data, paving the way for stellar-parameter estimates for many billions of stars.
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All authors Xue Lu, Haibo Yuan, Kai Xiao, Bowen Huang, Ruoyi Zhang, Lin Yang, Timothy C. Beers, Shuai Xu

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics

Molecular diversity as a biosignature

The search for life in the Solar System hinges on data from planetary missions. Detecting biosignatures based on molecular identity, isotopic composition, or chiral excess requires measurements that current and planned missions can only partially provide. We introduce a new class of biosignatures, defined by the statistical organization of molecular assemblages and quantified using diversity metrics. Using this framework, we analyze amino-acid diversity across a dataset spanning terrestrial and extraterrestrial contexts. We find that biotic samples are consistently more diverse – and therefore distinct – from their sparser abiotic counterparts. This distinction also holds for fatty acids, indicating that the diversity signal reflects a fundamental biosynthetic signature. It also proves persistent under modeled space-like degradation. Relying only on relative abundances, this biogenicity assessment strategy is applicable to any molecular composition data from archived, current, and planned planetary missions. By capturing a fundamental statistical property of life's chemical organization, it may also transcend biosignatures that are contingent on Earth's evolutionary history.
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All authors Gideon Yoffe, Fabian Klenner, Barak Sober, Yohai Kaspi, Itay Halevy

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics

Photoevaporation Can Reproduce Extended $\mathrm{H_2}$ Emission from Protoplanetary Disks Imaged by JWST MIRI

Understanding dispersal of protoplanetary disks remains a central challenge in planet formation theory. Disk winds, driven by magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) and/or photoevaporation, are now recognized as primary agents of dispersal. With the advent of James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), spatially resolved imaging of these winds, particularly in H2 pure rotational lines, has become possible, revealing X-shaped morphologies and integrated fluxes of $\sim 10^{-16}$-$10^{-15}{\rm \,erg\,s^{-1}\,cm^{-2}}$. However, the lack of theoretical models suitable for direct comparison has limited interpretation of these features. To address this, we present the first model of photoevaporative \ce{H2} winds tailored for direct comparison with JWST observations. Using radiation hydrodynamics simulations coupled with chemistry, we derive steady-state wind structures and post-process them to compute H2 level populations and line radiative transfer, including collisional excitation and spontaneous decay. Our synthetic images reproduce the observed X-shaped morphology with radial extents of $\gtrsim 50$-$300{\rm \,au}$ and semi-opening angles of $\sim 37^\circ$-$50^\circ$, matching observations of Tau 042021 and SY Cha. While the predicted line fluxes are somewhat lower than the observed values. These results suggest that photoevaporation is a viable mechanism for reproducing key features of observed H2 winds, including morphology and fluxes, though conclusive identification of the wind origin requires source-specific modeling. This challenges the reliance on geometrical structures alone to distinguish between MHD winds and photoevaporation. Based on our findings, we also discuss alternative diagnostics of photoevaporative winds. This work provides a critical first step toward interpreting spatially resolved H2 winds and motivates future modeling efforts.
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All authors R. Nakatani, G. Rosotti, B. Tabone, A. Sellek

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics

On the Gravitational Collapse of Small Dust Grains in Self-gravitating Disk Structures

Planet formation may begin much earlier than previously expected, when the protoplanetary disk is still massive and gravitationally unstable. It has been proposed that solid grains can concentrate in the spiral arms of self-gravitating disks, leading to the formation of planetary embryos or cores that can greatly accelerate the process of planet formation. We perform hydrodynamic simulations of self-gravitating gas and even smaller dust grains than previously investigated in 3-dimensional shearing box simulations to explore the conditions necessary to form these planetary seeds. Focusing on small grains of dimensionless stopping time $\mathrm{St}=0.01$ and shorter, we find that disk metallicities $Z \gtrsim 0.02$ can overcome the disruptive effects of dust diffusion among these small dust grains. In the outer reaches of a gravitationally unstable disk, these models correspond to grains of approximately 1$\,mm$ and lead to planetary embryos between 0.1 and 1 Earth mass. The formation of these planetary embryos could therefore reduce the time needed for planet assembly, particularly in the outer regions of the disk where coagulation timescales are longer and solid growth is limited.
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All authors Hans Baehr, Ken Rice, Chao-Chin Yang, Cassandra Hall

Solar and Stellar Astrophysics

First Time Observed M-Shaped Coronal Mass Ejection Associated with a Blowout Jet and an Extreme Ultraviolet Wave

The coronal blowout jet, extreme ultraviolet (EUV) wave and coronal mass ejection (CME) are common phenomena in the solar atmosphere. In this paper, we report the occurrence of an M-shaped CME event associated with a blowout jet and an EUV wave using high-resolution, multi-angle and multi-wavelength observations taken from Solar Dynamics Observatory, and Solar TErrestrial RElations Observatory. Interestingly, and for the first time, it is found that two bubble-like CMEs and a jet-like CME were simultaneously triggered by the same eruptive event. Our observational analyses and findings indicate the following: (1) the eruption of a blowout jet led to a large-scale EUV wave; (2) the eruption of the EUV wave swept a small filament (prominence) and a long filament; (3) eventually the EUV wave split-up into two parts, leading to the two bubble-like CMEs, while the blowout jet induced a jet-like CME. The combined events appear to form an M-shape like structure CME, that we sketch throughout a proposed cartoon tentatively explaining the observed complex configuration. Based on observational diagnosis, we argue that the jet, the EUV wave and the multi-CME are highly interlinked. A suggested eruption-model, from the solar atmosphere to the space, is outlined and discussed, providing a possibly new way to probe the relationship between the solar eruptions and the surrounding space. The investigation of such rare phenomenon can be a key point for better understanding of the physical associated triggering mechanisms and energy transport in the solar atmosphere, crucial for MHD simulations and modeling.
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All authors Yu-Hu Miao, Lin-Hua Deng, Chao-Wei Jiang, Abouazza Elmhamdi, Jiang-Tao Su, Ming-Xiang Guan, Hai-Xin Zou, Jiao-Man Li, Xue-Mei Cao, Jun-Tao Wang, Yun-Zhi Hua

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Cross-listed from gr-qc

Structural Properties of Magnetized Neutron Stars under f (R, T ) Gravity Framework

The current work investigates the structural properties of neutron stars in the presence of a strong magnetic field within the framework of f(R,T) modified gravity, where the matter-geometry coupling leads to deviations from general relativity at high matter densities. We present here the mass-radius sequences, as well as the mass and pressure distributions for various values of the modified gravity parameter and the central magnetic field. The modified Tolman-Oppenheimer- Volkoff equations are numerically solved using isotropic equations of state, specifically the APR, FPS, and SLy models. Comparing the corresponding results in the context of general relativity suggests that more negative values of the modified gravity parameter result in higher maximum gravitational masses. In contrast, strong central magnetic fields of up to 1018 Gauss cause only a slight decrease in maximum mass without disrupting spherical symmetry. Our findings are in agreement with the observed data from GW170817, PSR and NICER.
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