Habitable Zones & Global Climate

N-body Simulation Models of the Galactic Habitable Zone

By Keith Cowing
Press Release
astro-ph.GA
April 8, 2016
Filed under
N-body Simulation Models of the Galactic Habitable Zone
Gaseous mass surface density. The time instant and integrated value for the given plotting range are indicated in each panel.
astro-ph.GA

We present an isolated Milky Way-like simulation in GADGET2 N-body SPH code. The Galactic disk star formation rate (SFR) surface densities and stellar mass indicative of Solar neighbourhood are used as thresholds to model the distribution of stellar mass in life friendly environments.

SFR and stellar component density are calculated averaging the GADGET2 particle properties on a 2D grid mapped on the Galactic plane. The peak values for possibly habitable stellar mass surface density move from 10 to 15 kpc cylindrical galactocentric distance in 10 Gyr simulated time span. At 10 Gyr the simulation results imply the following. Stellar particles which have spent almost all of their life time in habitable friendly conditions reside typically at ∼16 kpc from Galactic centre and are ∼3 Gyr old. Stellar particles that have spent ≥90% of their 4−5 Gyr long life time in habitable friendly conditions, are also predominantly found in the outskirts of the Galactic disk. Less then 1% of these particles can be found at a typical Solar system galactocentric distance of 8−10 kpc.

Our results imply that the evolution of an isolated spiral galaxy is likely to result in galactic civilizations emerging at the outskirts of the galactic disk around stellar hosts younger than the Sun.

B. Vukotić, D. Steinhauser, G. Martinez-Aviles, M.M. Ćirković, M. Micic, S. Schindler
(Submitted on 6 Apr 2016)

Comments: To appear in MNRAS
Subjects: Astrophysics of Galaxies (astro-ph.GA)
Cite as: arXiv:1604.01664 [astro-ph.GA] (or arXiv:1604.01664v1 [astro-ph.GA] for this version)
Submission history
From: Branislav Vukotić
[v1] Wed, 6 Apr 2016 15:42:48 GMT (4532kb,D)
http://arxiv.org/abs/1604.01664

Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA Space Station Payload manager/space biologist, Away Teams, Journalist, Lapsed climber, Synaesthete, Na’Vi-Jedi-Freman-Buddhist-mix, ASL, Devon Island and Everest Base Camp veteran, (he/him) 🖖🏻