Extraordinary increase of lifetime of localized cold clouds by the viscous effect in thermally-unstable two-phase interstellar media

TL;DR

This study shows that viscosity significantly prolongs the lifetime of localized cold clouds in thermally unstable interstellar media by balancing pressure gradients, which suppresses evaporation and stabilizes cloud structures.

Contribution

It introduces a numerical analysis demonstrating the crucial role of viscosity in maintaining long-lived interstellar clouds, a factor often neglected in previous research.

Findings

Viscosity balances pressure gradients to suppress cloud evaporation.

Localized clouds are attracted to and stabilized at pulselike stationary solutions.

Viscosity's role is essential for accurate modeling of cloud longevity.

Abstract

We numerically examine the influence of the viscosity on the relaxation process of localized clouds in thermally unstable two-phase media, which are locally heated by cosmic ray and cooled by radiation. Pulselike stationary solutions of the media are numerically obtained by a shooting method. In one-dimensional direct numerical simulations, localized clouds are formed during the two-phase separation and sustained extraordinarily. Such long-lived clouds have been recently observed in interstellar media. We demonstrate that the balance of the viscosity with a pressure gradient remarkably suppresses the evaporation of the clouds and controls the relaxation process. This balance fixes the peak pressure of localized structures and then the structure is attracted and trapped to one of the pulselike stationary solutions. While the viscosity has been neglected in most of previous studies, our study suggests that the precise treatment of the viscosity is necessary to discuss the evaporation of the clouds.