An Etymological Dictionary of Astronomy and Astrophysics
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1) A region within a system where mass or energy is given up, in contrast to a → source, where mass or energy is released.
2) In hydrodynamics simulation codes of gaseous collapse and → accretion, such as → smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH), a region of the flow that accretes incoming material but that does not allow it to leave. In in theses simulations an enormous dynamic range is usually encountered, which makes the full problem computationally infeasible. Indeed dynamic range requires enough resolution elements in both space and time to resolve the largest and smallest scales present in the problem. Sinks provide a way of concentrating resolution in regions of interest and evolving different regions with different time-steps. These entities can have stellar scale masses. See also → sink particle.

M.E. sinken, O.E. sincan, from verb; cf. O.S. sinkan, O.N. sökkva, M.Du. sinken, Du. zinken, O.H.G. sinkan, Ger. sinken, Goth. sigqan "to sink."

Câhak, from câh "a well" (Mid.Pers. câh "a well;" Av. cāt- "a well," from kan- "to dig," uskən- "to dig out;" O.Pers. kan- "to dig;" Mod.Pers. kandan "to dig;" cf. Skt. khan- "to dig," khanati "he digs," kha- "cavity, hollow, cave, aperture") + -ak diminutive suffix.

In hydrodynamics codes, a way of treating a collapsing or accreting region, such as a star, as a simple → point mass. Indeed, in many situations, the scale of interest is much larger than the scale of the → accreting object itself and it would be impossible to perform the calculation otherwise. → Sinks are generally modeled as → Lagrangian particles (see, e.g., Bates et al. 1995, MNRAS 277, 362; Krumholz et al. 2004, ApJ 611, 399; Federrath et al. 2010, ApJ 713, 269).

→ sink; → particle.