Modeling gas clouds in the vicinity of a black hole

This project studies how gas clouds orbiting the Galactic Centre evolve under strong tidal forces, fragmentation, and radiative cooling. By performing hydrodynamical simulations that include gravitational fragmentation and cooling-driven condensation, it aims to understand the conditions under which such clouds survive or dissipate.

Gas clouds such as G2 orbit the central supermassive black hole of the Milky Way. On their journey they are subject to extreme gravitational acceleration which disrupts them eventually before the gas reaches the black hole. Counteracting this fragmentation is radiative cooling which – aided by turbulent mixing – continuously creates new, cold gas and effectively keeps the gas cloud “alive”. In this project you will perform hydrodynamical simulations to study the evolution of a gas cloud subject to gravitational fragmentation with the inclusion of gravitational cooling.