Publication
Title
Numerical overcooling in shocks
Author
Abstract
We present a study of cooling in radiative shocks simulated with smoothed particle hydrodynamics and adaptive mesh refinement codes. We obtain a similarity solution for a shock-tube problem in the presence of radiative cooling, and test how well the solution is reproduced in gadget and flash. Shock broadening governed by the details of the numerical scheme (artificial viscosity or Riemann solvers) leads to potentially significant overcooling in both codes. We interpret our findings in terms of a resolution criterion, and apply it to realistic simulations of cosmological accretion shocks on to galaxy haloes, cold accretion and thermal feedback from supernovae or active galactic nuclei (AGN). To avoid numerical overcooling of accretion shocks on to haloes that should develop a hot corona a particle or cell mass resolution of 106 M⊙ is required, which is within reach of current state-of-the-art simulations. At this mass resolution, thermal feedback in the interstellar medium of a galaxy requires temperatures of supernova- or AGN-driven bubbles to be in excess of 107 K at densities of nH= 1.0 cm−3, in order to avoid spurious suppression of the feedback by numerical overcooling.
Language
English
Source (journal)
Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. - Oxford, 1983, currens
Publication
Oxford : 2011
ISSN
0035-8711 [print]
1365-2966 [online]
DOI
10.1111/J.1365-2966.2011.19001.X
Volume/pages
415 :4 (2011) , p. 3706-3720
ISI
000294204900065
Full text (Publisher's DOI)
Full text (publisher's version - intranet only)
UAntwerpen
Faculty/Department
Research group
Publication type
Subject
Affiliation
Publications with a UAntwerp address
External links
Web of Science
Record
Identifier
Creation 25.11.2011
Last edited 15.11.2022
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