arXiv subjects

Mahmood Roshan

Publications and source records attributed to Mahmood Roshan.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2021

Dynamical Friction and Tidal Interactions

We discuss dynamical friction in an $N$-body system in the presence of tidal interactions caused by a distant external source. Using the distant tide approximation, we develop a perturbation scheme for the calculation of dynamical friction that takes tidal effects into account to linear order. In this initial analytic approach to the problem, we neglect the influence of tides on the distribution function of stars in the background stellar system. Our result for the dynamical friction force in the appropriate limit is in agreement with Chandrasekhar's formula in the absence of tides. We provide preliminary estimates for the tidal contributions to the dynamical friction force. The astrophysical implications of our results are briefly discussed.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2021

Dynamical Friction in Nonlocal Gravity

We study dynamical friction in the Newtonian regime of nonlocal gravity (NLG), which is a classical nonlocal generalization of Einstein's theory of gravitation. The nonlocal aspect of NLG simulates dark matter. The attributes of the resulting effective dark matter are described and the main physical predictions of nonlocal gravity, which has a characteristic lengthscale of order 1 kpc, for galactic dynamics are presented. Within the framework of NLG, we derive the analogue of Chandrasekhar's formula for dynamical friction. The astrophysical implications of the results for the apparent rotation of a central bar subject to dynamical friction in a barred spiral galaxy are briefly discussed.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2021

Fast galaxy bars continue to challenge standard cosmology

Many observed disc galaxies harbour a central bar. In the standard cosmological paradigm, galactic bars should be slowed down by dynamical friction from the dark matter halo. This friction depends on the galaxy's physical properties in a complex way, making it impossible to formulate analytically. Fortunately, cosmological hydrodynamical simulations provide an excellent statistical population of galaxies, letting us quantify how simulated galactic bars evolve within dark matter haloes. We measure bar strengths, lengths, and pattern speeds in barred galaxies in state-of-the-art cosmological hydrodynamical simulations of the IllustrisTNG and EAGLE projects, using techniques similar to those used observationally. We then compare our results with the largest available observational sample at redshift $z=0$. We show that the tension between these simulations and observations in the ratio of corotation radius to bar length is $12.62σ$ (TNG50), $13.56σ$ (TNG100), $2.94σ$ (EAGLE50), and $9.69σ$ (EAGLE100), revealing for the first time that the significant tension reported previously persists in the recently released TNG50. The lower statistical tension in EAGLE50 is actually caused by it only having 5 galaxies suitable for our analysis, but all four simulations give similar statistics for the bar pattern speed distribution. In addition, the fraction of disc galaxies with bars is similar between TNG50 and TNG100, though somewhat above EAGLE100. The simulated bar fraction and its trend with stellar mass both differ greatly from observations. These dramatic disagreements cast serious doubt on whether galaxies actually have massive cold dark matter haloes, with their associated dynamical friction acting on galactic bars.

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arXiv2021

Relativistic Tidal Accelerations in the Exterior Schwarzschild Spacetime

We study further a general relativistic mechanism for the acquisition of tidal energy by free test particles near a gravitationally collapsed configuration. Specifically, we investigate the solutions of timelike geodesic equation in a Fermi normal coordinate system established about the world line of an accelerated observer that remains spatially at rest in the exterior Schwarzschild spacetime. Such static observers in effect define the rest frame of the collapsed source. The gain in tidal energy is due to local spacetime curvature. Previous work in this direction in connection with astrophysical jets involved geodesic motion along the Kerr rotation axis where outward moving particles could be tidally accelerated to almost the speed of light if their initial speed, as measured by the reference observer, is above a certain threshold escape velocity. We focus here for simplicity on the exterior Schwarzschild spacetime and show that the effective tidal acceleration to near the speed of light can occur for geodesic motion in certain radially outward directions. The implications of these results for the physics of gravitationally collapsed systems are briefly discussed.

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arXiv2021

Barred spiral galaxies in modified gravity theories

When bars form within galaxy formation simulations in the standard cosmological context, dynamical friction with dark matter (DM) causes them to rotate rather slowly. However, almost all observed galactic bars are fast in terms of the ratio between corotation radius and bar length. Here, we explicitly display an $8σ$ tension between the observed distribution of this ratio and that in the EAGLE simulation at redshift 0. We also compare the evolution of Newtonian galactic discs embedded in DM haloes to their evolution in three extended gravity theories: Milgromian Dynamics (MOND), a model of non-local gravity, and a scalar-tensor-vector gravity theory (MOG). Although our models start with the same initial baryonic distribution and rotation curve, the long-term evolution is different. The bar instability happens more violently in MOND compared to the other models. There are some common features between the extended gravity models, in particular the negligible role played by dynamical friction $-$ which plays a key role in the DM model. Partly for this reason, all extended gravity models predict weaker bars and faster bar pattern speeds compared to the DM case. Although the absence of strong bars in our idealized, isolated extended gravity simulations is in tension with observations, they reproduce the strong observational preference for `fast' bar pattern speeds, which we could not do with DM. We confirm previous findings that apparently `ultrafast' bars can be due to bar-spiral arm alignment leading to an overestimated bar length, especially in extended gravity scenarios where the bar is already fast.

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arXiv2020

Generalized Energy-Momentum-Squared Gravity in the Palatini Formalism

We study the generalized version of energy-momentum squared gravity (EMSG) in the Palatini formalism. This theory allows the existence of a scalar constructed with energy-momentum tensor as $T_{αβ}T^{αβ}$ in the generic action of the theory. We study the most general form of this theory in the Palatini framework and present the underlying field equations. The equations of motion of a massive test particle have been derived. The weak field limit of the theory is explored and the generalized version of the Poisson equation is obtained. Moreover, we explore the cosmological behavior of the theory with emphasis on bouncing solutions. Some new bouncing solutions for the specific Palatini EMSG model given by the Lagrangian density $\mathcal{L}=R+βR^2+ηT_{μν}T^{μν}$ are introduced. We show that only the case $η>0$ can lead to viable cosmic bounce.

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arXiv2020

Gravitational radiation by magnetic field: application to millisecond magnetars

We investigate the direct contribution of the magnetic field to the gravitational wave generation. To do so, we study the post-Newtonian energy-momentum tensor of the magnetized fluid and the post-Newtonian expansion of the gravitational potential in the wave zone. We show that the magnetic field appears even in the first post-Newtonian order of the multipole moment tensor. Then, we find an explicit relativistic correction containing the magnetic field contribution to the well-known quadrupole formula. As an application of this derivation, we find that the B-field part of the gravitational waves released in the early stages of a millisecond magnetar's life can be as much as one-hundredth of the signals due to the deformed rotating neutron stars. We show that although the event rate of this system is small, the signal would lie in the sensitivity range of the next generation of detectors.

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arXiv2020

Does modified gravity predict fast stellar bars in spiral galaxies?

The evolution of disk galaxies in modified gravity is studied by using high-resolution N-body simulations. More specifically, we use the weak field limit of two modified gravity theories, i.e., nonlocal gravity (NLG) and scalar-tensor-vector gravity known as MOG, and ignore the existence of dark matter halo. On the other hand, we construct the same models in the standard dark matter model and compare their dynamics with the galactic models in modified gravity. It turns out that there are serious differences between galactic models in these different viewpoints. For example, we explicitly show that the galactic models in modified gravity, host faster bars compared to the dark matter case. On the other hand, final stellar bars are weaker in modified gravity. These facts are not new and have already been reported in our previous simulations for exponential galactic models. Therefore, our main purpose in this study is to show that the above-mentioned differences, with emphasis on the speed of the bars, are independent of the initial density profile of the adopted disk/halo. To do so, we employ different profiles for the disk and halo and show that the results remain qualitatively independent of the initial galactic models. Moreover, a more accurate method has been used to quantify the kinematic properties of the stellar bar. Our results imply that contrary to the dark matter models, bars in modified gravity are fast rotators which never leave the fast-bar region until the end of the simulation.

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arXiv2020

Jeans analysis in energy-momentum-squared gravity

In this paper, we study the Jeans analysis in the context of energy-momentum-squared gravity (EMSG). More specifically we find the new Jeans mass for non-rotating infinite mediums as the smallest mass scale for local perturbations that can be stable against its own gravity. Furthermore, for rotating mediums, specifically for rotating thin disks in the context of EMSG, we find a new Toomre-like criterion for the local gravitational stability. Finally, the results are applied to a hyper-massive neutron star, as an astrophysical system. Using a simplified toy model we have shown that, for a positive (negative) value of the EMSG parameter $α$, the system is stable (unstable) in a wide range of $α$. On the other hand, no observational evidence has been reported on the existence of local fragmentation in HMNS. Naturally, this means that EMSG with positive $α$ is more acceptable from the physical point of view.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2020

Linear cosmological perturbations in Scalar-tensor-vector gravity

We investigate the cosmological perturbations in the context of a Scalar-Tensor-Vector theory of Gravity known as MOG in the literature. Recent investigations show that MOG reproduces a viable background cosmological evolution comparable to $Λ$CDM. However, the matter-dominated era is slightly different. In this paper, we study the linear matter perturbations and estimate the relevant modified gravity parameters. We show that MOG reduces the growth rate of the perturbations and comparing with the RSD data reveals that MOG suggests a higher value for $σ_8$, compare to $Λ$CDM. This point, constitutes a powerful challenge to the cosmological viability of MOG.

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arXiv2019

Evolution of spiral galaxies in nonlocal gravity

We study the evolution of simulated disk galaxies in the context of a nonlocal theory of gravity. In this theory the appearance of the dark matter problem in cosmology and astrophysics is a manifestation of the nonlocality of the gravitational interaction. Using high-resolution N-body simulations, we investigate the dynamical evolution of disk galaxies and compare the result with the standard dark matter viewpoint. Specifically, we construct two exponential galaxy models, one in nonlocal gravity (NLG) and the other surrounded by a Plummer dark matter halo. Both systems start from the same baryonic matter distribution, particles velocities, random velocities and the initial Toomre's parameter. However, although the initial conditions are the same in both models, their long-term dynamics reveals some notable differences. For example, it turns out that the bar instability happens with higher rate in NLG model compared with the standard case. On the other hand, at the end of the simulation, we find that bars are weaker and faster in NLG compared with the standard case.

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arXiv2018

Post-Newtonian magnetohydrodynamics

In this paper, we derive the post-Newtonian equations of the ideal Magnetohydrodynamics. To do so, we use the modern approach to post-Newtonian theory, where the harmonic gauge is used instead of the standard post-Newtonian gauge, and find the post-Newtonian metric in the presence of the electromagnetic fields. We show that although the electric field does not contribute in the metric and curvature of the spacetime, the magnetic field appears in the time-time component of the metric. The appearance of the magnetic field, in principle, leads to new relativistic contributions to the magnetohydrodynamic governing equations. Therefore, using the post-Newtonian metric, we find the relativistic corrections to the magnetohydrodynamic equations up to the first post-Newtonian order. In addition, as usage of this derivation, we obtain a complete set of equations by which the behavior of a self-gravitating plasma can be determined in post-Newtonian gravity.

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arXiv2018

Post-Newtonian corrections to Toomre's criterion

The gravitational stability of a two-dimensional self-gravitating and differentially rotating gaseous disk in the context of post-Newtonian (hereafter PN) theory is studied. Using the perturbative method and applying the second iterated equations of PN approximation, the relativistic version of the dispersion relation for the propagation of small perturbations is found. We obtain the PN version of Toomre's local stability criterion by utilizing this PN dispersion relation. In other words, we find relativistic corrections to Toomre's criterion in the first PN approximation. Two stability parameters $η$ and $μ$ related to gravity and pressure are introduced. We illustrate how these parameters determine the stability of the Newtonian and PN systems. Moreover, we show that, in general, the differentially rotating fluid disk is more stable in the context of PN theory relative to the Newtonian one. Also, we explicitly show that although the relativistic PN corrections destabilize non-rotating systems, they have the stabilizing role in the rotating thin disks. Finally, we apply the results to the relativistic disks around hypermassive neutron stars (HMNSs), and find that although Newtonian description predicts the occurrence of local fragmentations, PN theory remains in agreement with the relevant simulations, and rules out the existence of local fragmentations.

astro-ph.HE↗

arXiv2018

Compact stars in Energy-Momentum Squared Gravity

A simple generalization to Einstein's general relativity (GR) was recently proposed which allows a correction term $T_{αβ}T^{αβ}$ in the action functional of the theory. This theory is called Energy-Momentum Squared Gravity (EMSG) and introduces a new coupling parameter $η$. EMSG resolves the big bang singularity and has a viable sequence of cosmological epochs in its thermal history. {Interestingly, in the vacuum EMSG is equivalent to GR, and its effects appear only inside the matter-energy distribution. More specifically, its consequences appear in high curvature regime. Therefore it is natural to expect deviations form GR inside compact stars. In order to study spherically symmetric compact stars in EMSG, we find the relativistic governing equations. More specifically, we find the generalized version of the Tolman-Oppenheimer-Volkov equation in EMSG. Finally we present two analytical solutions, and two numerical solutions for the field equations. For obtaining the numerical solutions we use polytropic equation of state which is widely used to understand the internal structure of neutron stars in the literature. Eventually we find a mass-radius relation for neutron stars. Also, We found that EMSG, depending on the central pressure of the star and the magnitude of free parameter $η$, can lead to larger or smaller masses for neutron stars compared with GR. Existence of high-mass neutron stars with ordinary polytropic equation of state in EMSG is important in the sense that these stars exist in GR provided that one use exotic equation of states.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2018

Local fragmentation of thin disks in Eddington-inspired gravity

We find the generalized version of the Toomre's criterion for the stability of a rotating thin disk in the context of Eddington inspired Born-Infeld (EiBI) gravity which possesses one free parameter $χ$. To do so we use the weak field limit of the theory and find the dispersion relation for the propagation of matter density waves on the surface of a self-gravitating and differentially rotating disk. Finally we find a new version of Toomre's stability criterion for thin disks. We show that EiBI gravity with negative $χ$ destabilizes all the rotating thin disks. On the other hand EiBI with positive $χ$ substantially can suppress the local fragmentation, and has stabilizing effects against axi-symmetric perturbations. More specifically, we show that only an annulus remains unstable on the surface of the disk. The width of the annulus directly depends on the magnitude of $χ$.

astro-ph.HE↗

arXiv2018

Stellar Bar evolution in the absence of dark matter halo

We study the stellar bar growth in high resolution numerical galaxy models with and without dark matter halos. In all models the galactic disk is exponential and the halos are rigid or live Plummer spheres. More specifically, when there is no dark matter halo, we modify the gravitational force between point particles. To do so we use the weak field limit of an alternative theory of dark matter known as MOG in the literature. The galaxy model in MOG has the same initial conditions as in galaxy models with dark matter halo. On the other hand, the initial random velocities and the Toomre's local stability parameter are the same for all the models. We show that the evolution and growth of the bar in MOG is substantially different from the standard cases including dark matter halo. More importantly, we find that the bar growth rate and its final magnitude is smaller in MOG. On the other hand, the maximum value of the bar in MOG is smaller than the Newtonian models. It is shown that although the live dark matter halo may support the bar instability, MOG has stabilizing effects. Furthermore, we show that MOG supports fast pattern speeds, and unlike in the dark matter halo models pattern speed does not decrease with time. Theses differences, combined with the relevant observations, may help to distinguish between dark matter an modified gravity in galactic scales.

astro-ph.GA↗

arXiv2018

On the cosmology of scalar-tensor-vector gravity theory

We consider the cosmological consequences of a special scalar-tensor-vector theory of gravity, known as MOG (for MOdified Gravity), proposed to address the dark matter problem. This theory introduces two scalar fields $G(x)$ and $μ(x)$, and one vector field $ϕ_α(x)$, in addition to the metric tensor. We set the corresponding self-interaction potentials to zero, as in the standard form of MOG. Then using the phase space analysis in the flat Friedmann-Robertson-Walker background, we show that the theory possesses a viable sequence of cosmological epochs with acceptable time dependency for the cosmic scale factor. We also investigate MOG's potential as a dark energy model and show that extra fields in MOG cannot provide a late time accelerated expansion. Furthermore, using a dynamical system approach to solve the non-linear field equations numerically, we calculate the angular size of the sound horizon, i.e. $θ_{\text{s}}$, in MOG. We find that $8\times 10^{-3}\text{rad}<θ_{\text{s}}<8.2\times 10^{-3} \text{rad} $ which is way outside the current observational bounds. Finally, we generalize MOG to a modified form called mMOG, and we find that mMOG passes the sound-horizon constraint. However, mMOG also cannot be considered as a dark energy model un;ess one adds a cosmological constant, and more importantly, the matter dominated era is still slightly different from the standard case.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2017

Gravitational instability of filamentary molecular clouds, including ambipolar diffusion; Non-isothermal filament

Recent observations of the filamentary molecular clouds show that their properties deviate from the isothermal equation of state. Theoretical investigations proposed that the logatropic and the polytropic equations of state with negative indexes can provide a better description for these filamentary structures. Here, we aim to compare the effects of these softer non-isothermal equation of states with their isothermal counterpart on the global gravitational instability of a filamentary molecular cloud. By incorporating the ambipolar diffusion, we use the non-ideal magnetohydrodynamics framework for a filament that is threaded by a uniform axial magnetic field. We perturb the fluid and obtain the dispersion relation both for the logatropic and polytropic equations of state by taking the effects of magnetic field and ambipolar diffusion into account. Our results suggest that, in absence of the magnetic field, a softer equation of state makes the system more prone to gravitational instability. We also observed that a moderate magnetic field is able to enhance the stability of the filament in a way that is sensitive to the equation of state in general. However, when the magnetic field is strong, this effect is suppressed and all the equations of state have almost the same stability properties. Moreover, we find that for all the considered equations of state, the ambipolar diffusion has destabilizing effects on the filament.

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