Intrinsic Brightness Temperatures of AGN Jets

Abstract

We present a new method for studying the intrinsic brightness temperatures of the parsec-scale jet cores of Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN). Our method uses observed superluminal motions and observed brightness temperatures for a large sample of AGN to constrain the characteristic intrinsic brightness temperature of the sample as a whole. To study changes in intrinsic brightness temperature, we assume that the Doppler factors of individual jets are constant in time as justified by their relatively small changes in observed flux density. We find that in their median-low brightness temperature state, the sources in our sample have a narrow range of intrinsic brightness temperatures centered on a characteristic temperature, T_int = 3 x 10^10 K, which is close to the value expected for equipartition, when the energy in the radiating particles equals the energy stored in the magnetic fields. However, in their maximum brightness state, we find that sources in our sample have a characteristic intrinsic brightness temperature greater than 2 x 10^11 K, which is well in excess of the equipartition temperature. In this state, we estimate the energy in radiating particles exceeds the energy in the magnetic field by a factor of ~ 10^5. We suggest that the excess of particle energy when sources are in their maximum brightness state is due to injection or acceleration of particles at the base of the jet. Our results suggest that the common method of estimating jet Doppler factors by using a single measurement of observed brightness temperature and/or the assumption of equipartition may lead to large scatter or systematic errors in the derived values.