Simulating the interstellar medium of galaxies with radiative transfer, non-equilibrium thermochemistry, and dust

Understand

We present a novel framework to self-consistently model the effects of radiation fields, dust physics and molecular chemistry (H$_2$) in the interstellar medium (ISM) of galaxies.

• The model combines a state-of-the-art radiation hydrodynamics module with a non-equilibrium thermochemistry module that accounts for H$_2$ coupled to a realistic dust formation and destruction model, all integrated into the new stellar feedback framework SMUGGLE.
• We test this model on high-resolution isolated Milky-Way (MW) simulations.
• We show that photoheating from young stars makes stellar feedback more efficient, but this effect is quite modest in low gas surface density galaxies like the MW.