The interaction of a supernova remnant with interstellar clouds using high order local adaptive mesh refinement methods

The interaction between supernova remnants (SNR) and interstellar clouds in the galaxy is known to play a major role in determining the structure of the interstellar medium (ISM). We know that the ISM is highly inhomogeneous, consisting of both diffuse atomic clouds (T∼100K) and dense molecular clouds (T∼10K) surrounded by a low density warm ionized gas (T∼104K) and by a very hot coronal gas (T∼106K). Next to radiation directly from stars, supernova explosions represent the most important form of energy injection into the ISM; they determine the velocity of interstellar clouds, accelerate cosmic rays, and can compress clouds to gravitational instability, possibly spawning a new generation of star formation. The shock waves from supernova remnants can compress, accelerate, disrupt and render hydrodynamically unstable interstellar clouds, thereby ejecting mass back into the intercloud medium. Thus, while the interaction of the SNR blast wave with cloud inhomogeneities can clearly alter the appearance of the ISM, the cloud inhomogeneities can similarly have a profound effect on the structure of the SNR