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Abstract The first infall of the LMC into the Milky Way (MW) represents a large and recent disruption to the MW circumgalactic medium (CGM). In this work, we use idealized, hydrodynamical simulations of an MW-like CGM embedded in a dark matter halo with an infalling LMC-like satellite initialized with its own CGM to understand how the encounter is shaping the global physical and kinematic properties of the MW CGM. First, we find that the LMC drives order-unity enhancements in MW CGM density, temperature, and pressure due to a shock from the supersonic CGM–CGM collision. The resulting shock front extends from the LMC to beyond ∼R200,MW, amplifying column densities, X-ray brightness, thermal Sunyaev–Zeldovich distortion, and potentially synchrotron emission from cosmic rays over large angular scales across the southern hemisphere. Second, the MW’s reflex motion relative to its outer halo induces a dipole in CGM radial velocities, withvR ± 30–50 km s−1atR > 50 kpc in the northern and southern hemispheres, respectively, consistent with measurements in the stellar halo. Finally, ram pressure strips most of the LMC’s CGM, leaving ∼108−9M⊙warm ionized gas along the past orbit of the LMC, moving at high radial and/or tangential velocities ∼50–100 kpc from the MW. Massive satellites like the LMC leave their mark on the CGM structure of their host galaxies, and signatures of such interactions may be observable in key all-sky tracers of the MW CGM and those of other massive galaxies.
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Figuring Out Gas & Galaxies in Enzo (FOGGIE). VI. The Circumgalactic Medium of L ∗ Galaxies Is Supported in an Emergent, Nonhydrostatic Equilibrium
Abstract The circumgalactic medium (CGM) is often assumed to exist in or near hydrostatic equilibrium, with the regulation of accretion and the effects of feedback treated as perturbations to a stable balance between gravity and thermal pressure. We investigate global hydrostatic equilibrium in the CGM using four highly resolvedL*galaxies from the Figuring Out Gas & Galaxies in Enzo (FOGGIE) project. The FOGGIE simulations were specifically targeted at fine spatial and mass resolution in the CGM (Δx≲ 1 kpch−1andM≃ 200M⊙). We develop a new analysis framework that calculates the forces provided by thermal pressure gradients, turbulent pressure gradients, ram pressure gradients of large-scale radial bulk flows, centrifugal rotation, and gravity acting on the gas in the CGM. Thermal and turbulent pressure gradients vary strongly on scales of ≲5 kpc throughout the CGM. Thermal pressure gradients provide the main supporting force only beyond ∼0.25R200, or ∼50 kpc atz= 0. Within ∼0.25R200, turbulent pressure gradients and rotational support provide stronger forces than thermal pressure. More generally, we find that global equilibrium models are neither appropriate nor predictive for the small scales probed by absorption line observations of the CGM. Local conditions generally cannot be derived by assuming a global equilibrium, but an emergent global equilibrium balancing radially inward and outward forces is obtained when averaging over the nonequilibrium local conditions on large scales in space and time. Approximate hydrostatic equilibrium holds only at large distances from galaxies, even when averaging out small-scale variations.
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- PAR ID:
- 10411426
- Publisher / Repository:
- DOI PREFIX: 10.3847
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- The Astrophysical Journal
- Volume:
- 948
- Issue:
- 1
- ISSN:
- 0004-637X
- Format(s):
- Medium: X Size: Article No. 43
- Size(s):
- Article No. 43
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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