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A. M. Carpenter, J. M. Blondin, K. J. Borkowski (NCSU, AAS)
Planetary nebulae are often modeled with some variant of the generalized interacting stellar winds model, in which a fast wind from the hot central star sweeps up circumstellar material ejected at low speeds during a previous epoch. In some instances, such as very young PNe, the gas densities are sufficiently high that radiative cooling of the shocked gas can lead to highly compressed shells of shocked wind material. In this case, the wind-swept shell can be subject to a dynamical instability. Using two-dimensional hydrodynamic simulations we investigate this instability and compare it to the corresponding planar case: the nonlinear thin shell instability, or NTSI. Unlike the planar case this instability does not require a non-linear perturbation, nor does the instability choke itself off. Instead, the instability saturates at a relatively large amplitude and remains thereafter in a quasi-steady state.
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