Osaka Feedback Model. II. Modeling Supernova Feedback Based on High-resolution Simulations

Abstract

Feedback from supernovae (SNe) is an essential mechanism that self-regulates the growth of galaxies, and a better model of SN feedback is still needed in galaxy-formation simulations. In the first part of this paper, using an Eulerian hydrodynamic code Athena++, we find the universal scaling relations for the time evolution of momentum and radius for a superbubble, when the momentum and time are scaled by those at the shell-formation time. In the second part of this paper, we develop a SN feedback model based on the Athena++ simulation results utilizing Voronoi tessellation around each star particle, and implement it into the GADGET3-Osaka smoothed particle hydrodynamic code. Our feedback model was demonstrated to be isotropic and conservative in terms of energy and momentum. We examined the mass/energy/metal loading factors and find that our stochastic thermal feedback model produced galactic outflow that carries metals high above the galactic plane but with weak suppression of star formation. Additional mechanical feedback further suppressed star formation and brought the simulation results into better agreement with the observations of the Kennicutt–Schmidt relation, with all the results being within the uncertainties of observed data. We argue that both thermal and mechanical feedback are necessary for the SN feedback model of galaxy evolution when an individual SN bubble is unresolved.