We report on the development of an implicit multi-D hydrodynamic code for stellar evolution. We present two test-cases relevant for the first scientific goal of the code: the simulation of convection in pulsating stars. First results on a realistic stellar model are also presented.
Numerical simulations of magneto-convection have greatly expanded our understanding of stellar interiors and stellar magnetism. Recently, fully compressible hydrodynamical simulations of full-star models have demonstrated the feasibility of studying the excitation and propagation of pressure and internal gravity waves in stellar interiors, which would allow for a direct comparison with asteroseismological measurements. However, the impact of magnetic fields on such waves has not been taken into account yet in three-dimensional simulations. We conduct a proof of concept for the realization of t…
Context. Multidimensional hydrodynamic simulations of convection in stellar interiors are numerically challenging, especially for flows at low Mach numbers. Methods. We explore the benefits of using a low-Mach hydrodynamic flux solver and demonstrate its usability for simulations in the astrophysical context. The time-implicit Seven-League Hydro (SLH) code was used to perform multidimensional simulations of convective helium shell burning based on a 25 M$_\odot$ star model. The results obtained with the low-Mach AUSM$^{+}$-up solver were compared to results when using its non low-Mach variant …
Supermassive stars are Population III stars with masses exceeding $10^4\,M_{\odot}$ that could be the progenitors of the first supermassive black holes. Their interiors are in a regime where radiation pressure dominates the equation of state. In this work, we use the explicit gas dynamics code PPMstar to simulate the hydrogen-burning core of a $10^4\,M_{\odot}$ supermassive main-sequence star. These are the first 3D hydrodynamics simulations of core convection in supermassive stars. We perform a series of ten simulations at different heating rates and on Cartesian grids with resolutions of $76…
Our ability to predict the structure and evolution of stars is in part limited by complex, 3D hydrodynamic processes such as convective boundary mixing. Hydrodynamic simulations help us understand the dynamics of stellar convection and convective boundaries. However, the codes used to compute such simulations are usually tested on extremely simple problems and the reliability and reproducibility of their predictions for turbulent flows is unclear. We define a test problem involving turbulent convection in a plane-parallel box, which leads to mass entrainment from, and internal-wave generation …
We present a numerical code for radiation hydrodynamics designed as a module for the freely available PLUTO code. We adopt a gray approximation and include radiative transfer following a two-moment approach by imposing the M1 closure to the radiation fields. This closure allows for a description of radiative transport in both the diffusion and free-streaming limits, and is able to describe highly anisotropic radiation transport as can be expected in the vicinity of an accreting planet in a protoplanetary disk. To reduce the computational cost caused by the timescale disparity between radiation…
Our understanding of stellar structure and evolution coming from one-dimensional (1D) stellar models is limited by uncertainties related to multi-dimensional processes taking place in stellar interiors. 1D models, however, can now be tested and improved with the help of detailed three-dimensional (3D) hydrodynamics models, which can reproduce complex multi-dimensional processes over short timescales, thanks to the recent advances in computing resources. Among these processes, turbulent entrainment leading to mixing across convective boundaries is one of the least understood and most impactful.…