1. Prevention is better than cure? Feedback from high specific energy winds in cosmological simulations with Arkenstone
- Author
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Bennett, Jake S., Smith, Matthew C., Fielding, Drummond B., Bryan, Greg L., Kim, Chang-Goo, Springel, Volker, and Hernquist, Lars
- Subjects
Astrophysics - Astrophysics of Galaxies ,Astrophysics - Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics - Abstract
We deploy the new Arkenstone galactic wind model in cosmological simulations for the first time, allowing us to robustly resolve the evolution and impact of high specific energy winds. In a (25$\,h^{-1}\,$Mpc)$^3$ box we perform a set of numerical experiments that systematically vary the mass and energy loadings of such winds, finding that their energy content is the key parameter controlling the stellar to dark matter mass ratio. Increasing the mass loading, at fixed energy, actually results in mildly enhanced star formation, counter to prevailing wisdom but in agreement with recent analytic models. Of the simple parametrisations that we test, we find that an energy loading that scales inversely with halo mass best matches a wide range of observations, and can do so with mass loadings drastically lower than those in most previous cosmological simulations. In this scenario, much less material is ejected from the interstellar medium. Instead, winds both heat gas in the circumgalactic medium, slowing infall onto the galaxy, and also drive shocks beyond the virial radius, preventing accretion onto the halo in the first place. We have not yet tied the mass and energy loadings to high-resolution simulations (a key goal of the Learning the Universe collaboration); however, we can already report that a much lower fraction of the available supernova energy is needed in preventative galaxy regulation than required by ejective wind feedback models such as IllustrisTNG., Comment: Submitted to MNRAS. 19 pages, 14 figures. This is a Learning the Universe publication
- Published
- 2024