Deciphering the origin and development history of peculiar winged radio galaxies

Abstract

A subset of Active Galactic Nuclei (AGNs) exhibit radio-loud behaviour with magnetised plasma jets that typically travel in straight paths over great distances. A lesser percentage of these jets do, however, deviate off course and develop the bending morphologies known as tailed and winged sources. While there is a general consensus that the translational motion of the host galaxy in an ambient medium causes the jets from tailed sources to bend in one direction. The jets from winged sources bend in the other way, creating a variety of complicated topologies that resemble X-, S-, Z-, or even W-like shapes. These galaxies are made up of a pair of active lobes, where a jet is constantly growing and curving the lobes, generally ending in a hotspot, along with a pair of secondary lobes, which are diffuse, less intense, and wider, resembling wings. Astronomers continue to have an intense debate about how winged sources develop, with no general agreement between them to date. This thesis work is devoted to investigating the formation and evolution history of such winged radio galaxies in order to better understand their salient and contentious properties.