Related papers: High molecular gas fractions in normal massive sta…
The interstellar medium of galaxies is composed of multiple phases, including molecular, atomic, and ionized gas, as well as dust. Stars are formed within this medium from cold molecular gas clouds, which collapse due to their gravitational…
Evidence is summarized that suggests that when a protogalaxy collapses, a fraction $f$ of its gas fails to heat to the virial temperature, where $f$ is large for haloes less massive than the value $M^*$ associated with $L^*$ galaxies. Stars…
When the cosmic star formation history peaks (z ~ 2), galaxies vigorously fed by cosmic reservoirs are gas dominated and contain massive star-forming clumps, thought to form by violent gravitational instabilities in highly turbulent…
Recent studies of galaxies ~2-3 Gyr after the Big Bang have revealed large, turbulent rotating systems. The existence of well-ordered rotation in galaxies during this peak epoch of cosmic star formation may suggest that gas accretion…
An overview of our current understanding of the formation and evolution of star clusters is given, with main emphasis on high-mass clusters. Clusters form deeply embedded within dense clouds of molecular gas. Left-over gas is cleared within…
The first galaxies contain stars born out of gas with little or no metals. The lack of metals is expected to inhibit efficient gas cooling and star formation but this effect has yet to be observed in galaxies with oxygen abundance relative…
Theory predicts and observations confirm that low-mass stars (like the Sun) in their early life grow by accreting gas from the surrounding material. But for stars ~ 10 times more massive than the Sun (~10 M_sun), the powerful stellar…
Observations of the interstellar medium are key to deciphering the physical processes regulating star formation in galaxies. However, observational uncertainties and detection limits can bias the interpretation unless carefully modeled.…
Recent observations have revealed massive galactic molecular outflows that may have physical conditions (high gas densities) required to form stars. Indeed, several recent models predict that such massive galactic outflows may ignite star…
We use high-resolution ($\simeq$ 35pc) hydrodynamical simulations of galaxy formation to investigate the relation between gas accretion and star formation in galaxies hosted by dark matter haloes of mass $10^{12}$ $\mathrm{M_\odot}$ at $z =…
Constraints on the molecular gas content of galaxies at high redshift are crucial to further our understanding of star formation and galaxy evolution through cosmic times, as molecular gas is the fuel for star formation. Since its initial…
Using studies of nearby star formation with Spitzer, I will argue that star formation is restricted to dense cores within molecular clouds. The nature of these dense cores and their connection to star formation will be discussed. Their…
Star formation in half of massive galaxies was quenched by the time the Universe was three billion years old. Very low amounts of molecular gas appear responsible for this, at least in some cases, though morphological gas stabilization,…
Quiescent galaxies (QGs) typically have little cold gas to form stars. The discovery of gas-rich QGs challenges our conventional understanding of the evolutionary paths of galaxies. We take advantage of a new catalog of nearby, massive…
Substantial numbers of morphologically regular early-type (elliptical and lenticular) galaxies contain molecular gas, and the quantities of gas are probably sufficient to explain recent estimates of the current level of star formation…
Star formation occurs on physical scales corresponding to individual star forming regions, typically of order ~100 parsecs in size, but current observational facilities cannot resolve these scales within field galaxies beyond the local…
Galaxies grow inefficiently, with only a few percent of the available gas converted into stars each free-fall time. Feedback processes, such as outflowing winds driven by radiation pressure, supernovae or supermassive black hole accretion,…
The cosmic star formation rate density first increases with time towards a pronounced peak 10 Gyrs ago (or z=1-2) and then slows down, dropping by more than a factor 10 since z=1. The processes at the origin of the star formation quenching…
Cold hydrogen gas is the raw fuel for star formation in galaxies, and its partition into atomic and molecular phases is a key quantity for galaxy evolution. In this Letter, we combine Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array and Arecibo…
On galactic scales, the surface density of star formation appears to be well correlated with the surface density of molecular gas. This has lead many authors to suggest that there exists a causal relationship between the chemical state of…