Jet Formation in Black Hole Accretion Systems I: Theoretical Unification Model

Abstract

Two types of relativistic jets are suggested to form near accreting black holes: a potentially ultrarelativistic Poynting-dominated jet and a Poynting-baryon jet. One source of jet matter is electron-positron pair production, which is driven by neutrino annihilation in GRBs and photon annihilation in AGN and x-ray binaries. GRB Poynting-dominated jets are also loaded by electron-proton pairs by the collisional cascade of Fick-diffused free neutrons. We show that, for the collapsar model, the neutrino-driven enthalpy flux (classic fireball model) is probably dominated by the Blandford-Znajek energy flux, which predicts a jet Lorentz factor of $Γ\sim 100-1000$. We show that radiatively inefficient AGN, such as M87, are synchrotron-cooling limited to $Γ\sim 2-10$. Radiatively efficient x-ray binaries, such as GRS1915+105, are Compton-drag limited to $Γ\lesssim 2$, but the jet may be destroyed by Compton drag. However, the Poynting-baryon jet is a collimated outflow with $Γ\sim 1-3$. The jet from radiatively efficient systems, such as microquasar GRS1915+105, may instead be a Poynting-baryon jet that is only relativistic when the disk is geometrically thick. In a companion paper, general relativistic hydromagnetic simulations of black hole accretion with pair creation are used to simulate jet formation in GRBs, AGN, and x-ray binaries.