Evolution and lifetime of transient clumps in the turbulent interstellar medium

TL;DR

This paper investigates the evolution and lifetimes of dense clumps in the turbulent interstellar medium, proposing that their existence is governed by larger-scale turbulence rather than their crossing time, supported by numerical simulations.

Contribution

It introduces a new perspective that clump lifetimes depend on large-scale turbulence and validates this through numerical simulations, linking lifetime to column density.

Findings

Clump lifetimes correlate with column density.

Lifetimes are influenced by large-scale turbulent motions.

Morphology and magnetization vary with clump mass.

Abstract

We study the evolution of dense clumps and provide argument that the existence of the clumps is not limited by the crossing time of the clump. We claim that the lifetimes of the clumps are determined by the turbulent motions on larger scale and predict the correlation of the clump lifetime and its column density. We use numerical simulations and successfully test this relation. In addition, we study the morphological asymmetry and the magnetization of the clumps as a function of their masses.