Related papers: Diffuse interstellar medium and the formation of m…
We review the role that magnetic field may have on the formation and evolution of molecular clouds. After a brief presentation and main assumptions leading to ideal MHD equations, their most important correction, namely the ion-neutral…
We investigate the formation and evolution of giant molecular clouds (GMCs) in a Milky-Way-like disk galaxy with a flat rotation curve. We perform a series of 3D adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) numerical simulations that follow both the…
We propose a simple theoretical model for star formation in which the local star formation rate in a galaxy is determined by three factors. First, the interplay between the interstellar radiation field and molecular self-shielding…
Star formation is triggered in essentially three ways: (1) the pressures from existing stars collect and squeeze nearby dense gas into gravitationally unstable configurations, (2) random compression from supersonic turbulence makes new…
Molecular clouds at the Galactic center (GC) have environments considerably different from their disk counterparts. The GC may therefore provide important clues about how the environment affects star formation. Interestingly, while the…
The early stages of star formation are closely related to the ambient conditions in the interstellar medium. Important questions such as dust abundance, size distribution, temperature distribution, fraction of molecular gas, fraction of…
In young star clusters, the density can be high enough and the velocity dispersion low enough for stars to collide and merge with a significant probability. This has been suggested as a possible way to build up the high-mass portion of the…
Star formation in our Galaxy occurs in molecular clouds that are self-gravitating, highly turbulent, and magnetized. We study the conditions under which cloud cores inherit large-scale magnetic field morphologies and how the field is…
Star clusters form in dense, hierarchically collapsing gas clouds. Bulk kinetic energy is transformed to turbulence with stars forming from cores fed by filaments. In the most compact regions, stellar feedback is least effective in removing…
Massive stars are very rare, but their extreme luminosities make them both the only type of young star we can observe in distant galaxies and the dominant energy sources in the universe today. They form rarely because efficient radiative…
We use magnetohydrodynamical simulations of converging flows to investigate the process of molecular cloud formation and evolution out of the magnetised ISM. Here, we investigate whether the observed subcritical HI clouds can become…
"The purpose of numerical models is not numbers but insight." (Hamming) In the spirit of this adage, and of Don Cox's approach to scientific speaking, we discuss the questions that the latest generation of numerical models of the…
In this chapter we review recent advances in understanding the roles that magnetic fields play throughout the star formation process, gained through observations and simulations of molecular clouds, the dense, star-forming phase of the…
How starburst clusters form out of molecular clouds is still an open question. In this article, I highlight some of the key constraints in this regard, that one can get from the dynamical evolutionary properties of dense stellar systems. I…
The formation of molecular clouds out of HI gas is the first step toward star formation. Its metallicity dependence plays a key role to determine star formation through the cosmic history. Previous theoretical studies with detailed chemical…
Outflows of pre-main-sequence stars drive shocks into molecular material within 0.01 - 1 pc of the young stars. The shock-heated gas emits infrared, millimeter and submillimeter lines of many species including. Dust grains are important…
We discuss HD and MHD compressible turbulence as a cloud-forming and cloud-structuring mechanism in the ISM. Results from a numerical model of the turbulent ISM at large scales suggest that the phase-like appearance of the medium, the…
Context. Molecular Clouds (MCs) are the place where stars are formed and their feedback starts to take place, regulating the evolution of galaxies. Therefore, MCs represent the critical scale at which to study how ultra-violet (UV) photons…
The magnetic field of molecular clouds (MCs) plays an important role in the process of star formation: it determins the statistical properties of supersonic turbulence that controls the fragmentation of MCs, controls the angular momentum…
One of the outstanding puzzles about star formation is why it proceeds so slowly. Giant molecular clouds convert only a few percent of their gas into stars per free-fall time, and recent observations show that this low star formation rate…