Two-Dimensional Axisymmetric Collapse of Thermally Unstable Primordial Clouds

We have performed two-dimensional hydrodynamic simulations of the collapse of isolated axisymmetric clouds condensing via radiative cooling in a primordial background gas. In order to study the development of the so-called “shapeinstability”, we have considered two types of axisymmetric clouds, oblate and prolate clouds of various sizes and with axial ratios of 0.5 ≤ Rc,R/Rc,z ≤ 2. We find that the degree of oblateness or prolateness is enhanced during the initial cooling phase. But it can be reversed later, if the initial contrast in cooling times between the cloud gas and the background gas is much greater than one. In such cases an oblate cloud collapses to a structure composed of an outer thin disk and a central prolate component. A prolate cloud, on the other hand, becomes a thin cigar-shape structure with a central dense oblate component. The reversal of shape in the central part of the cooled clouds is due to supersonic motions either along the disk plane in the case of oblate clouds or along the symmetry axis in the case of prolate clouds. For a background gas of Th = 1.7 × 10K and nh = 0.1 cm −3 in a protogalactic halo environment, the mean density of the cloud gas that has cooled to 10K increases to 100nh or so, in our simulations where nonequilibrium cooling is adopted and the background gas cools too. The