The four-population model: a new classification scheme for pre-planetesimal collisions

Context. Within the collision growth scenario for planetesimal formation, the growth step from centimetre-sized pre-planetesimals to kilometre-sized planetesimals remains unclear. The formation of larger objects from the highly porous pre-planetesimals may be halted by a combination of fragmentation in disruptive collisions and mutual rebound with compaction. However, the right amount of fragmentation is necessary to explain the observed dust features in late T Tauri discs. Therefore, detailed data on the outcome of pre-planetesimal collisions is required and has to be presented in a suitable and precise format. Aims. We wish to develop a new classification scheme broad enough to encompass all events with sticking, bouncing, and fragmentation contributions, accurate enough to capture the important collision outcome nuances, and at the same time simple enough to be implementable in global dust coagulation simulations. We furthermore wish to demonstrate the reliability of our numerical smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) model and the applicability of our new collision outcome classification to previous results as well as our simulation results. Methods. We propose and apply a scheme based on the quantitative aspects of four fragment populations: the largest and second largest fragment, a power-law population, and a sub-resolution population. For the simulations of pre-planetesimal collisions, we adopt the SPH numerical scheme with extensions for the simulation of porous solid bodies. On the basis of laboratory benchmark experiments, this model was previously calibrated and tested for the correct simulation of the compaction, bouncing, and fragmentation behaviour of macroscopic highly porous SiO2 dust aggregates. Results. We demonstrate that previous attempts to map collision data were much too oriented on qualitatively categorising into sticking, bouncing, and fragmentation events. Intermediate categories are found in our simulations that are difficult to map to existing qualitative categorisations. We show that the four-population model encompasses all previous categorisations and in addition allows for transitions. This is because it is based on quantitative characteristic attributes of each population such as the mass, kinetic energy, and filling factor. In addition, the numerical porosity model successfully passes another benchmark test: the correct simulation of the entire list of collision outcome types yielded by laboratory experiments. As a demonstration of the applicability and the power of the four-population model, we utilise it to present the results of a study on the influence of collision velocity in head-on collisions of intermediate porosity aggregates.