AGN Heating in Simulated Cool-Core Clusters

Understand

We analyze heating and cooling processes in an idealized simulation of a cool-core cluster, where momentum-driven AGN feedback balances radiative cooling in a time-averaged sense.

• We find that, on average, energy dissipation via shock waves is almost an order of magnitude higher than via turbulence.
• Most of the shock waves in the simulation are very weak shocks with Mach numbers smaller than 1.5, but the stronger shocks, although rare, dissipate energy more effectively.
• We find that shock dissipation is a steep function of radius, with most of the energy dissipated within 30 kpc, while radiative cooling loses area less concentrated.