Hans Moritz Günther edited Windspeed.tex  about 10 years ago

Commit id: 44814ba95227c133fab5640a0114568e226e26d2

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In our model, we use a spherically symmetric stellar wind with a constant velocity. For a solar-type wind this works well to derive the shape of the shock front because eqn.~\ref{eqn:r0} contains the total energy flux $\dot E = \rho v^2_\infty \propto \dot M v_\infty$. However, a lower wind velocity and higher density at the equator would lead to lower post-shock temperatures with a higher emission measure close to the disk plane.  \citet{2007IAUS..243..299M} show the that  stellar winds from CTTSthat are launched hot  cannot have a total mass loss above $10^{-11}M_\odot\mathrm{ yr}^{-1}$ if they are launched hot  or the high densities required to reach this mass loss would lead to a catastrophic cooling the wind that runaway cooling. This  should be observable and would probably hinder the launching. Thus, the winds of CTTS are probably more complex than just a scaled up version of the solar wind. Still, the wind speeds observed in the sun provide a reasonable estimate for $v_\infty$. Figure~\ref{fig:v_infty} shows how a large $v_\infty$ and a correspondingly large ram pressure of the stellar wind pushes push  the shock front out to much larger heights a higher  above the disk plane plane,  similar to outflows with a larger $\dot M$. Additionally, $v_\infty$ is the single most important parameter that controls the maximal post-shock temperatures and the amount of hot plasma that is generated. plasma.