[139.18] Building an Equilibrium Distribution for the Simulation of Coupled Rayleigh-Taylor and Self-Gravity Driven Interfacial Instabilities

AAS 205th Meeting, 9-13 January 2005
Session 139 The Ionized ISM: Observations and Theory
Poster, Thursday, January 13, 2005, 9:20am-4:00pm, Exhibit Hall

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[139.18] Building an Equilibrium Distribution for the Simulation of Coupled Rayleigh-Taylor and Self-Gravity Driven Interfacial Instabilities

R.M. Hueckstaedt (Los Alamos National Laboratory), J.H. Hunter, Jr. (University of Florida)

Hydrodynamical instabilities are key processes in the ISM. Interacting clouds and flows give rise to complex structures and may fuel star formation. Previously, we have examined the self-gravity driven interfacial instability (SGI), which acts upon a density interface, and contrasted its behavior to that of the Rayleigh-Taylor (RT) instability. We now continue our study by coupling the two instabilities. As a first step, we develop and test a solution to the equation of hydrostatic equilibrium when both self-gravity and a global, constant acceleration are present. The result is a pressure distribution with a non-zero gradient at the interface. We use numerical simulations to test the equilibrium solution and model the evolution of perturbed interfaces.

The author(s) of this abstract have provided an email address for comments about the abstract: rmhx@lanl.gov

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