Polarization-sensitive Compton scattering by accelerated electrons

Abstract

We describe upgrades to a numerical code which computes synchrotron and inverse-Compton emission from relativistic plasma including full polarization. The introduced upgrades concern scattering kernel which is now capable of scattering the polarized and unpolarized photons on non-thermal population of electrons. We describe the scheme to approach this problem and we test the numerical code against known analytic solution. Finally, using the upgraded code, we predict polarization of light that is scattered off sub-relativistic thermal or relativistic thermal and non-thermal free electrons. The upgraded code enables more realistic simulations of emissions from plasma jets associated with accreting compact objects.