Dynamics of a supernova envelope in a cloudy interstellar medium

Abstract

The evolution of a supernova remnant in a cloudy medium as a function of the volume filling factor of the clouds is studied in a three-dimensional axially symmetrical model. The model includes the mixing of heavy elements (metals) ejected by the supernova and their contribution to radiative losses. The interaction of the supernova envelope with the cloudy phase of the interstellar medium leads to nonsimultaneous, and on average earlier, onsets of the radiative phase in different parts of the supernova envelope. Growth in the volume filling factor $f$ leads to a decrease in the time for the transition of the envelope to the radiative phase and a decrease in the envelope's mean radius, due to the increased energy losses by the envelope in the cloudy medium. When the development of hydrodynamical instabilities in the supernova envelope is efficient, the thermal energy falls as $E_t\sim t^{-2.3}$, for the propagation of the supernova remnant through either a homogeneous or a cloudy medium. When the volume filling factor is $f\simgt 0.1$, a layer with excess kinetic energy andmomentumforms far behind the global shock front from the supernova, which traps the hot gas of the cavity in the central part of the supernova remnant. Metals ejected by the supernova are also enclosed in the central region of the remnant, where the initial (high) metallicity is essentially preserved. Thus, the interaction of the supernova envelope with the cloudy interstellar medium appreciably changes the dynamics and structure of the distribution of the gas in the remnant. This affects the observational characteristics of the remnant, in particularly, leading to substantial fluctuations of the emission measure of the gas with $T>10^5$~K and the velocity dispersion of the ionized gas.