2013MNRAS.434.2209W

The observed bimodality in radio luminosity in galaxy clusters is puzzling: cosmic rays (CRs) accelerated by structure formation shocks are expected to indiscriminately produce bright radio haloes in every cluster. We investigate the possibility that CR streaming in the intracluster medium (ICM) can `switch off' hadronically induced radio and gamma-ray emission. For self-confined CRs, this depends on the source of magnetohydrodynamic wave damping: if only non-linear Landau damping operates, then CRs stream on the slow Alfvénic time-scale, but if turbulent wave damping operates, super-Alfvénic streaming is possible. As turbulence increases, it promotes outward streaming more than it enables inward turbulent advection. Curiously, the CR flux is independent of ∇f (as long as it is non-zero) and depends only on plasma parameters; this enables radio haloes with flat inferred CR profiles to turn off. We perform 1D time-dependent calculations of a radio mini-halo (Perseus) and giant radio halo (Coma) and find that both diminish in radio luminosity by an order of magnitude in several hundred Myr, given plausible estimates for the magnetic field in the outskirts of the cluster. Due to the energy dependence of CR streaming, spectral curvature develops, and radio haloes turn off more slowly at low frequencies - properties consistent with observations. Similarly, CR streaming rapidly turns off gamma-ray emission at the high energies probed by Cherenkov telescopes, but not at the low energies probed by Fermi. CR mediated wave heating of the ICM is unaffected, as it is dominated by ∼ GeV CRs which stream Alfvénically.