How do different spiral arm models impact the ISM and GMC population?

Pettitt, Alex R., Dobbs, Clare L., Baba, Junichi, Colombo, Dario, Duarte-Cabral, Ana ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5259-4774, Egusa, Fumi and Habe, Asao 2020. How do different spiral arm models impact the ISM and GMC population? Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 498 (1) , pp. 1159-1174. 10.1093/mnras/staa2242

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Abstract

The nature of galactic spiral arms in disc galaxies remains elusive. Regardless of the spiral model, arms are expected to play a role in sculpting the star-forming interstellar medium (ISM). As such, different arm models may result in differences in the structure of the ISM and molecular cloud properties. In this study, we present simulations of galactic discs subject to spiral arm perturbations of different natures. We find very little difference in how the cloud population or gas kinematics vary between the different grand design spirals, indicating that the ISM on cloud scales cares little about where spiral arms come from. We do, however, see a difference in the interarm/arm mass spectra, and minor differences in tails of the distributions of cloud properties (as well as radial variations in the stellar/gaseous velocity dispersions). These features can be attributed to differences in the radial dependence of the pattern speeds between the different spiral models, and could act as a metric of the nature of spiral structure in observational studies.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Physics and Astronomy
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
ISSN:	0035-8711
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	18 November 2020
Date of Acceptance:	27 July 2020
Last Modified:	06 May 2023 04:44
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/136460

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