The subcritical baroclinic instability in local accretion disc models

By Geo, roy Lesur, J. Papaloizou. 2009

150 citations recorded by the source corpus.

(abridged) Aims: We present new results exhibiting a subcritical baroclinic instability (SBI) in local shearing box models. We describe the 2D and 3D behaviour of this instability using numerical simulations and we present a simple analytical model describing the underlying physical process. Results: A subcritical baroclinic instability is observed in flows stable for the Solberg-Hoiland criterion using local simulations. This instability is found to be a nonlinear (or subcritical) instability, which cannot be described by ordinary linear approaches. It requires a radial entropy gradient weakly unstable for the Schwartzchild criterion and a strong thermal diffusivity (or equivalently a short cooling time). In compressible simulations, the instability produces density waves which transport angular momentum outward with typically alpha<3e-3, the exact value depending on the background temperature profile. Finally, the instability survives in 3D, vortex cores becoming turbulent due to parametric instabilities. Conclusions: The subcritical baroclinic instability is a robust phenomenon, which can be captured using local simulations. The instability survives in 3D thanks to a balance between the 2D SBI and 3D parametric instabilities. Finally, this instability can lead to a weak outward transport of angular momentum, due to the generation of density waves by the vortices.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Biomedical Engineering

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/f8ad045f0cd9ae3e9dff6061006520cf91f12177

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Citations in the corpus

WIND-DRIVEN ACCRETION IN PROTOPLANETARY DISKS. I. SUPPRESSION OF THE MAGNETOROTATIONAL INSTABILITY AND LAUNCHING OF THE MAGNETOCENTRIFUGAL WIND (2013, background): “…(Johansen et al. 2009; Bai & Stone 2010a), or the gravitational instability mechanism (Lee et al. 2010; Youdin 2011), or via the vortices generated by the baroclinic instability (Lesur & Papaloizou 2010; Lyra & Klahr 2011) or the Rossby wave instability (Lovelace et al. 1999; Meheut et al. 2012).”
Global Simulations of the Inner Regions of Protoplanetary Disks with Comprehensive Disk Microphysics (2017, background): “Any further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and DOI. convective overstability (Lesur & Papaloizou 2010; Lyra & Klahr 2011; Klahr & Hubbard 2014; Lyra 2014), and the zombie vortex instability (Marcus et al. 2013, 2014).”
Linear and non-linear evolution of the vertical shear instability in accretion discs (2012, methodology): “…1991), the global and subcritical baroclinic instabilities (SBI; Klahr & Bodenheimer 2003; Johnson & Gammie 2006; Petersen, Stewart & Julien 2007; Lesur & Papaloizou 2010) and the vertical shear instability (Urpin & Brandenburg 1998; Urpin 2003; Arlt & Urpin 2004) which is closely related to…”
Possible planet-forming regions on submillimetre images (2011, unknown): “Another way to generate vortices is the baroclinic instability, proposed by (Klahr & Bodenheimer 2003), and recently confirmed by several works (e.g., Petersen et al. 2007a,b; Lesur & Papaloizou 2010; Lyra & Klahr 2011).”
Dust Evolution and the Formation of Planetesimals (2016, background): “The baroclinic instability is a process analogous to radial convection (Klahr & Bodenheimer 2003; Lesur & Papaloizou 2010; Raettig et al. 2013).”
Dynamics of Protoplanetary Disks (2010, methodology): “The simulations of Lesur & Papaloizou (2010) find that the instability is strongest for a diffusion time scale that is of the order of 10 Ω−1K , and suggest that density waves generated by the vortices (observed in compressible simulations) may generate a weak outward flux of angular momentum…”