Polarized Line Formation in Multi-dimensional Media. III. Hanle Effect with Partial Frequency Redistribution

Abstract

In two previous papers, we solved the polarized radiative transfer (RT) equation in multi-dimensional (multi-D) geometries with partial frequency redistribution as the scattering mechanism. We assumed Rayleigh scattering as the only source of linear polarization (Q/I, U/I) in both these papers. In this paper, we extend these previous works to include the effect of weak oriented magnetic fields (Hanle effect) on line scattering. We generalize the technique of Stokes vector decomposition in terms of the irreducible spherical tensors $\mathcal {T}^K_Q$, developed by Anusha & Nagendra, to the case of RT with Hanle effect. A fast iterative method of solution (based on the Stabilized Preconditioned Bi-Conjugate-Gradient technique), developed by Anusha et al., is now generalized to the case of RT in magnetized three-dimensional media. We use the efficient short-characteristics formal solution method for multi-D media, generalized appropriately to the present context. The main results of this paper are the following: (1) a comparison of emergent (I, Q/I, U/I) profiles formed in one-dimensional (1D) media, with the corresponding emergent, spatially averaged profiles formed in multi-D media, shows that in the spatially resolved structures, the assumption of 1D may lead to large errors in linear polarization, especially in the line wings. (2) The multi-D RT in semi-infinite non-magnetic media causes a strong spatial variation of the emergent (Q/I, U/I) profiles, which is more pronounced in the line wings. (3) The presence of a weak magnetic field modifies the spatial variation of the emergent (Q/I, U/I) profiles in the line core, by producing significant changes in their magnitudes.