Turbulence Driven by Stellar Jets, the Possibility and the Efficiency

Abstract

Abstract We investigate the feedback of the stellar jets on the surrounding interstellar gas based on 2D and 3D simulations applying HD and MHD modules of the PLUTO 4.2 code. The main question we address is whether the stellar jet can be considered as a turbulence driver into the interstellar gas. In addition, we investigate the most effective circumstances in which the driven turbulence is larger and can survive for a longer timescale in the ambient gas. We present a case study of different parameter runs including the jet Mach number, the initial jet velocity field, the background magnetic field geometries and the interacting jets. We also study the environmental effects on the jet-gas interaction by considering the non-homogeneous surrounding gas containing the clumps in the model setup. Among different setups, we find (1) a higher jet Mach number, (2) a rotating jet, (3) a jet propagating in a magnetized environment, (4) a jet propagating in a non-homogeneous environment, and (5) the interacting jets produce more fluctuations and random motions in the entrained gas, which can survive for a longer timescale. In addition, we perform the 3D simulations of jet-ambient gas interaction and we find that the amount of (subsonic–supersonic) fluctuation increases compared to the axisymmetric run, and the entrained gas gains higher velocities in a 3D run. In total, we confirm the previous finding that the stellar jets can transfer the turbulence on neighboring regions and are not sufficient drivers of the large-scale supersonic turbulence in molecular clouds.