Multifractality and the Density-Size Relation of Turbulent Clouds

Details Multifractality and the Density-Size Relation of Turbulent Clouds Multifractality and the Density-Size Relation of Turbulent Clouds

Oct 2000

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2000aas...196.6306c&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society, 196th AAS Meeting, #63.06; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 32, p.1286

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astronomy

Scientific paper

Multifractal analysis is a powerful technique that allows categorizing the structure of complex objects. We present preliminary results on the multifractal spectrum (f(α )) of observational and numerically simulated ISM data. We consider neutral and molecular gas data, as well as numerical simulations in two and three dimensions of the ISM at intermediate scales (hunderds of pc). For purely fractal objects, the multifractal spectrum reduces to a single point. When applied to observational and simulated ISM data, the technique shows well-defined multifractal spectra in all cases, including velocity-channel projections of 3D density cubes (3D), showing that the ISM has a multifractal structure, rather than being a simple fractal. For density data, the quantity α corresponds to the scaling exponent between density and size. The fact that a range of values of α is found in all cases supports previous claims (VS, BP & Rodríguez 1997) that this exponent is not unique. Additionally, for density data, much of the f(α ) curve lies on negative values of α , indicating the hierarchical structuring of the field (larger structures have smaller average densities). This property is also satisfied by projected velocity-channel data. Three- and two-dimensional simulations show significantly different f(α ) curves, suggesting intrinsically different geometrical properties. Finally, the same simulation at different times shows different f(α ) curves, suggesting that, contrary to classical incompressible turbulent flows, compressible turbulence does not belong to a single universality class (Chappell & Scalo 2000).

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