The effect of scaling magnetization on global Pulsar Magnetosphere simulations

The plasma composition and structure of pulsar magnetospheres and the physical processes that drive particle acceleration are not well understood. Global pulsar magnetosphere simulations are required to answer these questions. However, resolving the current sheet skin-depth which is O(106) smaller than the pulsar radius for realistic systems, is intractable even on large supercomputers. Thus, the polar cap magnetization in global PIC simulations is typically scaled-down, restricting the maximum energy of the charged particles. We will present the effect of scaling down the magnetization on particle acceleration, energy dissipation, and Poynting flux. We use WarpX, a highly scalable, electromagnetic PIC code with advanced algorithms to mitigate numerical artifacts in mesh-refinement simulations. We will also present 3D simulations to study the effect of pulsar obliquity and magnetization on the plasma structure and Poynting flux.