Turbulent stripping of interstellar clouds by interaction with supernova remnants
- Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (USA)
We present results for the interaction of a supernovae remnant blast wave with a small interstellar cloud, using for the first time high resolution local adaptive mesh refinement techniques with an underlying second order accurate 2-D Godunov hydrodynamic scheme. The cloud shock is assumed to be strong enough that it is non-radiative. We follow the morphological evolution of the cloud in great detail as it undergoes a series of complex shock-shock interactions and Kelvin-Helmholtz and Rayleigh-Taylor instabilities. We demonstrate, over a large range of cloud densities and shock strengths, that clouds are efficiently destroyed in a few cloud crushing times (essentially, the Rayleigh Taylor time) by a combination of instabilities and large scale shear flow. We investigate the scaling properties of clouds of different densities and shocks of different strengths. Our results have uncovered the development of copious supersonic vortex rings produced in the shear flow layer of the interaction. These vortex rings may wrap up ambient magnetic fields, enhancing the synchrotron emission and possibly explaining the compact radio hot spots seen in Cas A. Our calculations have, for the first time, carried the cloud-shock interaction well into the fragmentation regime. We demonstrate that similar calculations with standard fixed grid hydrodynamic schemes would require one to two orders of magnitude more computational time than is needed with our adaptive mesh approach to achieve comparable results. 20 refs., 114 figs., 1 tab.
- Research Organization:
- Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- DOE/DP
- DOE Contract Number:
- W-7405-ENG-48
- OSTI ID:
- 5288524
- Report Number(s):
- UCRL-101851; CONF-8906257-1; ON: DE90003622
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 1989 centennial meeting of the American Astronomical Society of the Pacific, Berkeley, CA (USA), 21-23 Jun 1989
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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Related Subjects
GENERAL PHYSICS
75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS
SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND SUPERFLUIDITY
INTERSTELLAR GRAINS
TURBULENT FLOW
CLOUDS
HYDRODYNAMIC MODEL
INTERSTELLAR MAGNETIC FIELDS
MASS
RAYLEIGH-TAYLOR INSTABILITY
SHEAR
SUPERNOVA REMNANTS
COSMIC RADIO SOURCES
FLUID FLOW
INSTABILITY
MAGNETIC FIELDS
MATHEMATICAL MODELS
PARTICLE MODELS
PARTICLES
STATISTICAL MODELS
THERMODYNAMIC MODEL
640102* - Astrophysics & Cosmology- Stars & Quasi-Stellar
Radio & X-Ray Sources
640410 - Fluid Physics- General Fluid Dynamics