Related papers: How Starless Are Starless Cores?

[Abridged] $Context.$ Pre-stellar cores are centrally concentrated starless cores on the verge of star formation and they represent the initial conditions for star and planet formation. Pre-stellar cores host an active organic chemistry and…

We present a census of the population of deeply embedded young stellar objects (YSOs) in the Ophiuchus molecular cloud complex based on a combination of Spitzer Space Telescope mid-infrared data from the "Cores to Disks" (c2d) legacy team…

We study the density structure of candidate contracting starless core L694-2 using 1.3 mm dust continuum observations from the IRAM Plateau de Bure Interferometer and the Berkeley-Illinois-Maryland Array, probing spatial scales from…

We present Spitzer Space Telescope observations of the "evolved starless core" L1521F which reveal the presence of a very low luminosity object (L < 0.07 Lsun). The object, L1521F-IRS, is directly detected at mid-infrared wavelengths (>5…

Deep JHKs photometry was obtained towards eight dense molecular cores and J-H vs. H-Ks color-color plots are presented. Our photometry, sensitive to the detection of a 1 solar mass, 1 X 10^6 year old star through approx. 35 - 50 magnitudes…

We propose a new analytic model for the initial conditions of protostellar collapse in relatively isolated regions of star formation. The model is non-magnetic, and is based on a Plummer-like radial density profile as its initial condition.…

In our SCUBA survey of Perseus, we find that the fraction of protostellar cores increases towards higher masses and the most massive cores are all protostellar. In this paper we consider the possible explanations of this apparent mass…

We present results from the Spitzer Space Telescope and molecular line observations of 9 species toward the dark cloud L43. The Spitzer images and molecular line maps suggest it has a starless core and a Class I protostar evolving in the…

Stars like our Sun form in self-gravitating dense and cold structures within interstellar clouds, called pre-stellar cores. Although much is known about the physical structure of dense clouds just before and soon after the switch-on of a…

Low-mass dense cores represent the state of molecular gas associated with the earliest phases of low-mass star formation. Such cores are called "protostellar" or "starless," depending on whether they do or do not contain compact sources of…

Interpreting the nature of starless cores has been a prominent goal in star formation for many years. In order to characterise the evolutionary stages of these objects, we perform synthetic observations of a numerical simulation of a…

Context. The classification of young stellar objects (YSOs) is typically done using the infrared spectral slope or bolometric temperature, but either can result in contamination of samples. More accurate methods to determine the…

The existence of cuspy or cored centers of dark matter halos is a crucial discriminant between different dark matter models. It has recently been claimed based on dynamical arguments that perfectly cored stellar systems cannot survive…

We present new results on CO depletion in a sample of nearby pre-stellar cores, based on observations of the millimeter C17O and C18O lines and the 1.3 mm dust emission with the IRAM 30m telescope. In most cases, the distribution of CO is…

Pre-stellar cores represent the initial conditions of star formation. Although these initial conditions in nearby low-mass star-forming regions have been investigated in detail, such initial conditions remain vastly unexplored for massive…

We study the structure and kinematics of nine 0.1 pc-scale cores in Orion with the IRAM 30-m telescope and at higher resolution eight of the cores with CARMA, using CS(2-1) as the main tracer. The single-dish moment zero maps of the…

Feedback from massive stars plays a key role in molecular cloud evolution. After the onset of star formation, the young stellar population is exposed by photoionization, winds, supernovae, and radiation pressure from massive stars. Recent…

Protostellar evolution, following the formation of the protostar is becoming reasonably well characterized, but the evolution from a prestellar core to a protostar is not well known, although the first hydrostatic core (FHSC) must be a…

By minimizing free energy density, we show that the stellar core of a hydrogen burning star is not in a global thermodynamical equilibrium unless density, temperature, mass and composition assume given values. The core (as the solar…

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…