85-08 Computational methods
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- 2003 (2)
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- English (2)
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- dust formation (2)
- stochastic boundaries (1)
- substellar atmospheres (1)
- turbulence (1)
- turbulence modelling (1)
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- ZIB Allgemein (2)
Dust formation {in brown dwarf atmospheres} is studied by utilizing a model for driven turbulence in the mesoscopic scale regime. We apply a pseudo-spectral method where waves are created and superimposed {within} a {limited} wavenumber interval. The turbulent kinetic energy distribution follows the Kolmogoroff spectrum which is assumed to be the most likely value. Such superimposed, stochastic waves may occur in a convectively active environment. They cause nucleation fronts and nucleation events and thereby initiate the dust formation process which { continues until} all condensible material is consumed. Small disturbances {are found to} have a large impact on the dust forming system. An initially dust-hostile region, which may originally be optically thin, becomes optically thick in a patchy way showing considerable variations in the dust properties during the formation process. The dust appears in lanes and curls as a result of the interaction with waves, i.e. turbulence, which form larger and larger structures with time. Aiming on a physical understanding of the variability of brown dwarfs, related to structure formation in substellar atmospheres, we work out first necessary criteria for small-scale closure models to be applied in macroscopic simulations of dust forming astrophysical systems.
Based on the knowledge gained from direct numerical simulations which are only possible in the microscale regime, a concept of driven turbulence is presented which allows to enter the mesoscopic scale regime. Here, dust formation under stochastic hydro- and thermodynamic conditions is studied: constructively superimposed stochastic waves initiate dust formation by the creation of singular nucleation events. It, hence, results a varying mean grain size and dust density in space and time. The newly formed dust changes the thermodynamic behavior from almost isotherm to adiabatic and chemically depletes the gas phase.