Related papers: L1506: a prestellar core in the making
Recent observations indicate that organic molecules are prevalent towards starless and prestellar cores. Deuteration of these molecules has not been well-studied during the starless phase. Published observations of singly-deuterated…
The deuterium fractionation in starless cores gives us a clue to estimate their lifetime scales, thus allowing us to distinguish between different dynamical theories of core formation. Cores also seem to be subject to a differential N2 and…
A fundamental issue in star formation is understanding the precise mechanisms leading to the formation of prestellar cores, and their subsequent gravitationally unstable evolution. To address this question, we carefully construct a suite of…
Planet formation around young stars requires the growth of interstellar dust grains from mm-sized particles to km-sized planetesimals. Numerical simulations have shown that large ($\sim$mm-sized) grains found in the inner envelope of young…
Observations of dark cloud cores have been carried out in the mid-infrared using ISOCAM and in the far-infrared using ISOPHOT, both aboard the Infrared Space Observatory. The cores are in most cases detected in emission at 200 and 170…
We have considered the thermal equilibrium in pre-protostellar cores in the approximation where the dust temperature is independent of interactions with the gas and where the gas is heated both by collisions with dust grains and ionization…
We present high resolution (0.2", 1000 AU) 1.3 mm ALMA observations of massive infrared dark cloud clump, G028.37+00.07-C1, thought to harbor the early stages of massive star formation. Using $\rm N_2D^+$(3-2) we resolve the previously…
CO isotopes are able to probe the different components in protostellar clouds. These components, core, envelope and outflow have distinct physical conditions and sometimes more than one component contributes to the observed line profile. In…
We construct models of molecular clouds that are considered as ensembles of transient cores. Each core is assumed to develop in the background gas of the cloud, grow to high density and decay into the background. The chemistry in each core…
The infrared dark clouds (IRDCs) G11.11$-$0.12 and G28.34$+$0.06 are two of the best-studied IRDCs in our Galaxy. These two clouds host clumps at different stages of evolution, including a massive dense clump in both clouds that is dark…
Dusty starless cores play an important role in regulating the initial phases of the formation of stars and planets. In their interiors, dust grains coagulate and ice mantles form, thereby changing the millimeter emissivities and hence the…
Context. Pre-stellar cores are the birthplaces of Sun-like stars and represent the initial conditions for the assembly of protoplanetary systems. Due to their short lifespans, they are rare. In recent efforts to increase the number of such…
We have mapped the large-scale structure of the Serpens cloud core using moderately optically thick (13CO(1--0) and CS(2--1)) and optically thin tracers (C18O(1--0), C34S(2--1), and N2H+(1--0)), using the 16-element focal plane array…
The detection of complex organic molecules (COMs) toward dense, collapsing prestellar cores has sparked interest in the fields of astrochemistry and astrobiology, yet the mechanisms for COM formation are still debated. It was originally…
We present a direct comparison of a chemical/physical model to multitransitional observations of C18O and 13CO towards the Barnard 68 pre-stellar core. These observations provide a sensitive test for models of low UV field photodissociation…
Only a handful of massive starless core candidates have been discovered so far, but none of them have been fully confirmed. Within the MM1 clump in the filamentary infrared dark cloud G34.43+0.24 that was covered by the ALMA-ATOMS survey at…
We have observed the low-mass molecular cloud core G204.4-11.3A2-NE (G204NE) in the direction of Orion B giant molecular cloud with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array in Band 6. The $\rm 1.3\ mm$ continuum images and…
Stars form in cold dense cores showing subsonic velocity dispersions. The parental molecular clouds display higher temperatures and supersonic velocity dispersions. The transition from core to cloud has been observed in velocity dispersion,…
Context: Molecular clouds are the prime locations of star formation. These clouds contain filamentary structures and cores which are crucial in the formation of young stars. Aims: In this work, we aim to quantify the physical properties of…
The first hydrostatic core, the first quasi-hydrostatic object formed during the star formation process, is still the observational missing link between the prestellar and protostellar phases, mainly due to its short lifetime. Although we…