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E.J. Hallman (University of Minnesota), D. Ryu (Chungnam National University, Korea), H. Kang (Pusan National University, Korea), T.W. Jones (University of Minnesota)
We will present results from cosmological numerical hydro/n-body simulations. Specifically we target complex structures in the clusters of galaxies that form, and in their immediate environment. These features include shocks and cold fronts. Clusters are synthetically observed, and the images are analyzed for evidence of these structures. Using time-resolved movies of the simulations in progress, we examine the evolution of clusters and groups in the simulations and its observable consequences.
The simulations use an Eulerian TVD type scheme for the gas and a particle mesh N-body method. The simulated volumes are (50h-1 Mpc)3 and (100h-1 Mpc)3 respectively. Each is represented by 10243 uniformly spaced grid points. The simulation evolves from early times (z ~ 40-60), from primordial density fluctuations in a concordance model LCDM universe, until the current epoch.
A wide array of complex structures form in the simulations, including filaments, accretion shocks, merger shocks and cluster internal shocks, as well as contact discontinuities which may give rise to the observed cold fronts. These features appear inside clusters, as well as in the surrounding warm/hot medium, and serve as a key diagnostic of the dynamical state of the gas, as well as a tracer of its evolution.
This work is supported by the NSF and the Minnesota Supercomputing Institute.
The author(s) of this abstract have provided an email address for comments about the abstract: hallman@astro.umn.edu
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Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 35#5
© 2003. The American Astronomical Soceity.