Exascale Simulations of Magnetized AGN Feedback

Diffuse plasmas in a wide range of astrophysical systems from galaxy clusters, galaxy groups, and galaxies can be greatly affected by embedded magnetic fields. The magnetically collimated jets emitted by active galactic nuclei (AGN) at the center of these systems are widely agreed to play a key role in the regulation of star and cold gas formation in these structures. The effect of the AGN’s magnetic fields on the system’s magnetic fields and ambient plasma, however, is still being explored. Magnetic fields injected by the AGN jet can affect dynamics on large scales on hundreds of kiloparsecs with the magnetized AGN jet down to small scales on parsecs or smaller with the small-scale turbulent dynamo. Modeling large portions of this huge span of dynamical ranges requires vast computing resources such as those provided by exascale supercomputers. To perform such simulations of magnetized AGN feedback on exascale supercomputers, we developed AthenaPK, an open source magnetohydrodynamics code capable of running at high performance on exascale supercomputer architectures. We present simulations of magnetized AGN feedback within galaxy groups and clusters with a focus on how magnetized AGN jets affect the energetics of the plasma. With exascale resources, we can model the plasma at much higher resolution with higher fidelity than previously possible, allowing us to resolve more physics within these systems.