Non-linear corrugation waves in spiral galaxies
Abstract
Numerical computations of non-linear corrugation waves in the gas disc of a spiral galaxy are reported. To obtain a tractable problem the set of fully three-dimensional hydrodynamic equations is reduced to a set of equations in two space dimensions by assuming that the global morphology of the corrugations is spiral, and then employing the tightly wound spiral approximation. The results indicate that the corrugation may be dynamically very significant leading to a strong variation in the gas density across the galactic disc. A corrugation which is singly periodic in azimuth produces a doubly periodic density enhancement, and the response can be strong enough to form a two-arm spiral shock.
- Publication:
-
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
- Pub Date:
- April 1980
- DOI:
- 10.1093/mnras/191.2.221
- Bibcode:
- 1980MNRAS.191..221N
- Keywords:
-
- Gas Dynamics;
- Gravitational Fields;
- Spiral Galaxies;
- Computerized Simulation;
- Galactic Structure;
- Gas Density;
- Hydrodynamic Equations;
- Numerical Analysis;
- Astrophysics