Nuclear spin relaxation within interstellar grains

We identify a new mechanism of internal dissipation of rotational kinetic energy in spinning dust grains, arising from the reorientation of nuclear angular momentum, e.g., spins of protons. Grain rotation induces magnetization of the nuclear spin system, with net alignment of nuclear spins parallel to the grain angular velocity. When the grain does not rotate around a principal axis, the nuclear magnetization vector precesses in grain-body coordinates, resulting in dissipation of energy. The analogous process involving electron spins was discovered by E. M. Purcell and termed "Barnett relaxation." We revisit the physics of the Barnett relaxation process and correct the estimate for the Barnett relaxation rate. We show that nuclear relaxation can be orders of magnitude more important than Barnett relaxation. This finding implies that the processes of "thermal flipping" and "thermal trapping" are important for a broad range of grain sizes.