Numerical Simulations of Turbulent Molecular Clouds Regulated by Reprocessed Radiation Feedback from Nascent Super Star Clusters

TL;DR

This study uses radiation hydrodynamics simulations to explore how reprocessed infrared radiation feedback influences star formation and cloud disruption in giant molecular clouds, emphasizing the role of dust opacity.

Contribution

It demonstrates that IR radiation feedback can disrupt clouds at high opacities and challenges the effectiveness of simplified trapping models in estimating radiation forces.

Findings

High IR opacity ($ 15 ext{ cm}^2 ext{ g}^{-1}$) is critical for cloud disruption.

IR feedback alone is unlikely to significantly suppress star formation unless dust or light-to-mass ratios are increased.

Trapping factor models may overestimate radiation forces by factors of 4-5.

Abstract

Radiation feedback from young star clusters embedded in giant molecular clouds (GMCs) is believed to be important to the control of star formation. For the most massive and dense clouds, including those in which super star clusters (SSCs) are born, pressure from reprocessed radiation exerted on dust grains may disperse a significant portion of the cloud mass back into the interstellar medium (ISM). Using our radiaton hydrodynamics (RHD) code, Hyperion, we conduct a series of numerical simulations to test this idea. Our models follow the evolution of self-gravitating, strongly turbulent clouds in which collapsing regions are replaced by radiating sink particles representing stellar clusters. We evaluate the dependence of the star formation efficiency (SFE) on the size and mass of the cloud and $\kappa$, the opacity of the gas to infrared (IR) radiation. We find that the single most important parameter determining the evolutionary outcome is $\kappa$, with $\kappa \gtrsim 15 \text{ cm}^2 \text{ g}^{-1}$ needed to disrupt clouds. For $\kappa = 20-40 \text{ cm}^2 \text{ g}^{-1}$, the resulting SFE=50-70% is similar to empirical estimates for some SSC-forming clouds. The opacities required for GMC disruption likely apply only in dust-enriched environments. We find that the subgrid model approach of boosting the direct radiation force $L/c$ by a "trapping factor" equal to a cloud's mean IR optical depth can overestimate the true radiation force by factors of $\sim 4-5$. We conclude that feedback from reprocessed IR radiation alone is unlikely to significantly reduce star formation within GMCs unless their dust abundances or cluster light-to-mass ratios are enhanced.