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Abstract:

We study how better resolving the cooling length of galactic outflows affect their energetics. We perform radiativehydrodynamical galaxy formation simulations of an isolated dwarf galaxy (M = 108 M) with the RAMSES-RTZ code, accounting for non-equilibrium cooling and chemistry coupled to radiative transfer. Our simulations reach a spatial resolution of 18 pc in the interstellar medium (ISM) using a traditional quasi-Lagrangian scheme. We further implement a new adaptive mesh refinement strategy to resolve the local gas cooling length, allowing us to gradually increase the resolution in the stellar-feedback-powered outflows, from ≥ 200 pc to 18 pc. The propagation of outflows into the inner circumgalactic medium is significantly modified by this additional resolution, but the ISM, star formation, and feedback remain by and large the same. With increasing resolution in the diffuse gas, the hot outflowing phase (T > 8 × 104 K) systematically reaches overall higher temperatures and stays hotter for longer as it propagates outwards. This leads to two-fold increases in the time-averaged mass and metal outflow loading factors away from the galaxy (r = 5 kpc), a five-fold increase in the average energy loading factor, and a ≈50 per cent increase in the number of sightlines with NO VI ≥ 1013 cm−2. Such a significant boost to the energetics of outflows without new feedback mechanisms or channels strongly motivates future studies quantifying the efficiency with which better-resolved multiphase outflows regulate galactic star formation in a cosmological context.

Abstract:

The 'core-cusp' problem is considered a key challenge to the ΛCDM paradigm. Haloes in dark matter only simulations exhibit 'cuspy' profiles, where density continuously increases towards the centre. However, the dark matter profiles of many observed galaxies (particularly in the dwarf regime) deviate strongly from this prediction, with much flatter central regions ('cores'). We use NewHorizon (NH), a hydrodynamical cosmological simulation, to investigate core formation, using a statistically significant number of galaxies in a cosmological volume. Haloes containing galaxies in the upper (M⋆ ≥ 1010.2 M⊙) and lower (M⋆ ≤ 108 M⊙) ends of the stellar mass distribution contain cusps. However, Haloes containing galaxies with intermediate (108 M⊙ ≤ M⋆ ≤ 1010.2 M⊙) stellar masses are generally cored, with typical halo masses between 1010.2 M⊙ and 1011.5 M⊙. Cores form through supernova-driven gas removal from halo centres, which alters the central gravitational potential, inducing dark matter to migrate to larger radii. While all massive (M⋆ ≥ 109.5 M⊙) galaxies undergo a cored-phase, in some cases cores can be removed and cusps reformed. This happens if a galaxy undergoes sustained star formation at high redshift, which results in stars (which, unlike the gas, cannot be removed by baryonic feedback) dominating the central gravitational potential. After cosmic star formation peaks, the number of cores, and the mass of the Haloes they are formed in, remain constant, indicating that cores are being routinely formed over cosmic time after a threshold halo mass is reached. The existence of cores is, therefore, not in tension with the standard paradigm.