Clustered Supernovae Drive Powerful Galactic Winds After Super-Bubble Breakout

We use three-dimensional hydrodynamic simulations of vertically stratified patches of galactic discs to study how the spatio-temporal clustering of supernovae (SNe) enhances the power of galactic winds. SNe that are randomly distributed throughout a galactic disc drive inefficient galactic winds because most supernova remnants lose their energy radiatively before breaking out of the disc. Accounting for the fact that most star formation is clustered alleviates this problem. Super-bubbles driven by the combined effects of clustered SNe propagate rapidly enough to break out of galactic discs well before the clusters' SNe stop going off. The radiative losses post-breakout are reduced dramatically and a large fraction ($\gtrsim 0.2$) of the energy released by SNe vents into the halo powering a strong galactic wind. These energetic winds are capable of providing strong preventative feedback and eject substantial mass from the galaxy with outflow rates on the order of the star formation rate. The momentum flux in the wind is only of order that injected by the SNe, because the hot gas vents before doing significant work on the surroundings. We show that our conclusions hold for a range of galaxy properties, both in the local Universe (e.g., M82) and at high redshift (e.g., $z \sim 2$ star forming galaxies). We further show that if the efficiency of forming star clusters increases with increasing gas surface density, as suggested by theoretical arguments, the condition for star cluster-driven super-bubbles to break out of galactic discs corresponds to a threshold star formation rate surface density for the onset of galactic winds $\sim 0.03$ M$_\odot$ yr$^{-1}$ kpc$^{-2}$, of order that observed.Comment: 19 pages, 12 figures, and 3 page appendix with 6 figures. Movies available at http://w.astro.berkeley.edu/~dfielding/#SNeDrivenWinds

Brightest Cluster Galaxies in Cosmological Simulations with Adaptive Mesh Refinement: Successes and Failures

A large sample of cosmological hydrodynamical zoom-in simulations with Adaptive Mesh Refinement (AMR) is analysed to study the properties of simulated Brightest Cluster Galaxies (BCGs). Following the formation and evolution of BCGs requires modeling an entire galaxy cluster, because the BCG properties are largely influenced by the state of the gas in the cluster and by interactions and mergers with satellites. BCG evolution is also deeply influenced by the presence of gas heating sources such as Active Galactic Nuclei (AGNs) that prevent catastrophic cooling of large amounts of gas. We show that AGN feedback is one of the most important mechanisms in shaping the properties of BCGs at low redshift by analysing our statistical sample of simulations with and without AGN feedback. When AGN feedback is included BCG masses, sizes, star formation rates and kinematic properties are closer to those of the observed systems. Some small discrepancies are observed only for the most massive BCGs and in the fraction of star-forming BCGs, effects that might be due to physical processes that are not included in our model.Comment: 11 pages, 2 tables, 8 figures. Accepted for publication in MNRA

The biasing of baryons on the cluster mass function and cosmological parameter estimation

We study the effect of baryonic processes on the halo mass function in the galaxy cluster mass range using a catalogue of 153 high resolution cosmological hydrodynamical simulations performed with the AMR code ramses. We use the results of our simulations within a simple analytical model to gauge the effects of baryon physics on the halo mass function. Neglect of AGN feedback leads to a significant boost in the cluster mass function similar to that reported by other authors. However, including AGN feedback not only gives rise to systems that are similar to observed galaxy clusters, but they also reverse the global baryonic effects on the clusters. The resulting mass function is closer to the unmodified dark matter halo mass function but still contains a mass dependent bias at the 5-10% level. These effects bias measurements of the cosmological parameters, such as $\sigma_8$ and $\Omega_m$. For current cluster surveys baryonic effects are within the noise for current survey volumes, but forthcoming and planned large SZ, X-ray and multi-wavelength surveys will be biased at the percent level by these processes. The predictions for the halo mass function including baryonic effects need to be carefully studied with larger and improved simulations. However, simulations of full cosmological boxes with the resolution we achieve and including AGN feedback are still computationally challenging.Comment: 12 pages, 3 tables, 6 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA

Simulations of Jet Heating in Galaxy Clusters: Successes and Challenges

We study how jets driven by active galactic nuclei influence the cooling flow in Perseus-like galaxy cluster cores with idealised, non-relativistic, hydrodynamical simulations performed with the Eulerian code ATHENA using high-resolution Godunov methods with low numerical diffusion. We use novel analysis methods to measure the cooling rate, the heating rate associated to multiple mechanisms, and the power associated with adiabatic compression/expansion. A significant reduction of the cooling rate and cooling flow within 20 kpc from the centre can be achieved with kinetic jets. However, at larger scales and away from the jet axis, the system relaxes to a cooling flow configuration. Jet feedback is anisotropic and is mostly distributed along the jet axis, where the cooling rate is reduced and a significant fraction of the jet power is converted into kinetic power of heated outflowing gas. Away from the jet axis weak shock heating represents the dominant heating source. Turbulent heating is significant only near the cluster centre, but it becomes inefficient at 50 kpc scales where it only represents a few percent of the total heating rate. Several details of the simulations depend on the choice made for the hydro solver, a consequence of the difficulty of achieving proper numerical convergence for this problem: current physics implementations and resolutions do not properly capture multi-phase gas that develops as a consequence of thermal instability. These processes happen at the grid scale and leave numerical solutions sensitive to the properties of the chosen hydro solver.Comment: Accepted for publication on MNRA

The formation of the brightest cluster galaxies in cosmological simulations: the case for active galactic nucleus feedback

We use 500 pc resolution cosmological simulations of a Virgo-like galaxy cluster to study the properties of the brightest cluster galaxy (BCG) that forms at the centre of the halo. We compared two simulations; one incorporating only supernova feedback and a second that also includes prescriptions for black hole growth and the resulting active galactic nucleus (AGN) feedback from gas accretion. As previous work has shown, with supernova feedback alone we are unable to reproduce any of the observed properties of massive cluster ellipticals. The resulting BCG rotates quickly, has a high Sérsic index, a strong mass excess in the centre and a total central density profile falling more steeply than isothermal. Furthermore, it is far too efficient at converting most of the available baryons into stars which is strongly constrained by abundance matching. With a treatment of black hole dynamics and AGN feedback the BCG properties are in good agreement with data: they rotate slowly, have a cored surface density profile, a flat or rising velocity dispersion profile and a low stellar mass fraction. The AGN provides a new mechanism to create cores in luminous elliptical galaxies; the core expands due to the combined effects of heating from dynamical friction of sinking massive black holes and AGN feedback that ejects gaseous material from the central region

The role of Active Galactic Nuclei feedback in the formation of the brightest cluster galaxies

The formation of the brightest cluster galaxies (BCG) is a challenge for galaxy formation theory. We performed high resolution cosmological hydrodynamical simulations with the AMR code RAMSES to study the properties of the BCG which forms at the center of a Virgo-like cluster. We compare the results of 2 galaxy formation scenarios, one in which only supernovae feedback is included, and one in which also AGN feedback is considered. Properties of the simulated BCG which are comparable with those of observed massive elliptical galaxies and BCGs cannot be obtained if AGN feedback is not considered. The stellar-to-halo mass ratio in simulations without AGN feedback appears too large when compared to observations, while it is compatible the observationally determined values when AGN feedback is included. The kinematical and structural properties of the BCG are extremely different in the two models. When we do not include AGN feedback, the BCG is quickly rotating, with high Sérsic index, a clear mass excess in the center and a very large stellar mass fraction. When AGN feedback is considered, the BCG is slowly rotating, with a significantly cored surface density profile and low stellar mass fractio

Erratum: Brightest cluster galaxies in cosmological simulations with adaptive mesh refinement: successes and failures

A large sample of cosmological hydrodynamical zoom-in simulations with adaptive mesh refinement is analysed to study the properties of simulated brightest cluster galaxies (BCGs). Following the formation and evolution of BCGs requires modelling an entire galaxy cluster, because the BCG properties are largely influenced by the state of the gas in the cluster and by interactions and mergers with satellites. BCG evolution is also deeply influenced by the presence of gas heating sources such as Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) that prevent catastrophic cooling of large amounts of gas. We show that AGN feedback is one of the most important mechanisms in shaping the properties of BCGs at low redshift by analysing our statistical sample of simulations with and without AGN feedback. When AGN feedback is included BCG masses, sizes, star formation rates and kinematic properties are closer to those of the observed systems. Some small discrepancies are observed only for the most massive BCGs and in the fraction of star-forming BCGs, effects that might be due to physical processes that are not included in our mode