English

Massive Outflows Driven by Magnetic Effects in Star Forming Clouds with High Mass Accretion Rates

Solar and Stellar Astrophysics 2017-07-05 v1 Astrophysics of Galaxies

Abstract

The relation between the mass accretion rate onto the circumstellar disc and the rate of mass ejection by magnetically driven winds is investigated using three-dimensional magnetohydrodynamics simulations. Using a spherical cloud core with a varying ratio of thermal to gravitational energy, which determines the mass accretion rate onto the disc, to define the initial conditions, the outflow propagation for approximately 10^4 yr after protostar formation is then calculated for several cloud cores. The mass ejection rate and accretion rate are comparable only when the magnetic energy of the initial cloud core is comparable to the gravitational energy. Consequently, in strongly magnetised clouds a higher mass accretion rate naturally produces both massive protostars and massive outflows. The simulated outflow mass, momentum, kinetic energy and momentum flux agree well with observations, indicating that massive stars form through the same mechanism as low-mass stars but require a significantly strong magnetic field to launch massive outflows.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1704.03185,
  title  = {Massive Outflows Driven by Magnetic Effects in Star Forming Clouds with High Mass Accretion Rates},
  author = {Yuko Matsushita and Masahiro N. Machida and Yuya Sakurai and Takashi Hosokawa},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1704.03185},
  year   = {2017}
}

Comments

52 pages, 18 figures, accepted for publication by MNRAS