High-energy particles from SN-explosions near the Galactic center

Abstract

Several supernovae exploding in a compact cluster of massive stars generate a galactic outflow with embedded shock waves. Based on numerical simulations for an expanding superbubble above the Galactic center we find that these individual waves generated by the repeated SN-explosions, interact with each other and finally coalesce into a single strong shock at a distance of 5 kpc above the Galactic plane at about 5 ċ 10⁶ years after outbreak. The resulting shock with a Mach number M ≃ 10 propagates up to 100 kpc in less than 10⁸ years. The time-dependent mass an energy loss out of the superbubble affects the further evolution of the outflow. In such long lasting shock waves energetic particles can be accelerated above the knee of 10¹⁵ eV already near the galactic plane by a first-order Fermi-mechanism. The additional pressure gradients from such cosmic rays lead to further accelerations of the galactic outflow since these ultra-relativistic particles suffer less from adiabatic losses than the thermal gas.