  We have carried out numerical hydrodynamic simulations of radio jets from
active galactic nuclei using the PLUTO simulation code, with the aim of
investigating the effect of different environments and intermittency of energy
injection on the resulting dynamics and observable properties of the
jet-inflated lobes. Initially conical jets are simulated in poor group and
cluster environments. We show that the environment into which a radio jet is
propagating plays a large role in the resulting morphology, dynamics and
observable properties of the radio source. The same jet collimates much later
in a poor group compared to a cluster, which leads to pronounced differences in
radio morphology. The intermittency of the jet also affects the observable
properties of the radio source, and multiple hotspots are present for multiple
outburst jets in the cluster environment. We quantify the detectability of
active and quiescent phases, and find this to be strongly
environment-dependent. We conclude that the dynamics and observational
properties of jets depend strongly on the details of energy injection and
environment.
