Related papers: Observational Evidence of Dynamic Star Formation R…
We present simulations of the evolution of self-gravitating dense gas on kiloparsec-size scales in a galactic disk, designed to study dense clump formation from giant molecular clouds (GMCs). These dense clumps are expected to be the…
The star formation rate (SFR) of the Milky Way remains poorly known, with often-quoted values ranging from 1 to 10 solar masses per year. This situation persists despite the potential for the Milky Way to serve as the ultimate SFR…
We present ALMA CO(1-0) observations toward the dust lane of the nearest elliptical and radio galaxy, NGC 5128 (Centaurus A), with high angular resolution ($\sim$ 1 arcsec, or 18 pc), including information from large to small spatial scales…
The processes of star formation and feedback, regulating the cycle of matter between gas and stars on the scales of giant molecular clouds (GMCs; $\sim$100pc), play a major role in governing galaxy evolution. Measuring the time-scales of…
We present the results of a galaxy-wide study of molecular gas and star formation in a sample of 76 HII regions in the nearby spiral galaxy NGC 300. We have measured the molecular gas at 250 pc scales using pointed CO(J=2-1) observations…
Does star formation proceed in the same way in large spirals such as the Milky Way and in smaller chemically younger galaxies? Earlier work suggests a more rapid transformation of H$_2$ into stars in these objects but (1) a doubt remains…
The formation of stars is inextricably linked to the structure of their parental molecular clouds. Here we take a number of nearby giant molecular clouds (GMCs) and analyse their column density and mass distributions. This investigation is…
The Schmidt law (SF law) in the Milky Way was investigated using 3D distribution maps of HII regions, HI and molecular (\Htwo) gases with spatial resolutions of $\sim 1$ kpc in the Galactic plane and a few tens of pc in the vertical…
We study the star formation (SF) law in 12 Galactic molecular clouds with ongoing high-mass star formation (HMSF) activity, as traced by the presence of a bright IRAS source and other HMSF tracers. We define the molecular cloud (MC)…
We report molecular line and continuum observations toward one of the most massive giant molecular clouds (GMCs), GMC-16, in M33 using ALMA with an angular resolution of 0$''$44 $\times$ 0$''$27 ($\sim$2 pc $\times$ 1 pc). We have found…
Giant molecular clouds (GMCs) and their stellar offspring are the building blocks of galaxies. The physical characteristics of GMCs and their evolution are tightly connected to galaxy evolution. The macroscopic properties of the…
We employ the Feedback In Realistic Environments (FIRE-2) physics model to study how the properties of giant molecular clouds (GMCs) evolve during galaxy mergers. We conduct a pixel-by-pixel analysis of molecular gas properties in both the…
With the HOPS, MALT90 and HiGAL Galactic plane surveys we are mapping a significant fraction of the dense, star-forming, molecular gas in the Galaxy. I present results from two projects based on this combined dataset, namely, (i) looking…
We analyse a sample of 52,000 Milky Way (MW) type galaxies drawn from the publicly available galaxy catalogue of the Millennium Simulation with the aim of studying statistically the differences and similarities of their properties in…
Motivated by the idea that a subset of HVCs trace dark matter substructure in the Local Group, we search for signs of star formation in the Smith Cloud, a nearby ~2x10^6 Msun HVC currently falling into the Milky Way. Using GALEX NUV and…
Star formation is an inefficient process and in general only a small fraction of the gas in a giant molecular cloud (GMC) is turned into stars. This is partly due to the negative effect of stellar feedback from young massive star clusters.…
We use simulations with realistic models for stellar feedback to study galaxy mergers. These high resolution (1 pc) simulations follow formation and destruction of individual GMCs and star clusters. The final starburst is dominated by in…
Giant molecular clouds (GMCs) are the major reservoirs of molecular gas in galaxies, and the starting point for star formation. As such, their properties play a key role in setting the initial conditions for the formation of stars. We…
A star formation efficiency per free fall time that evolves over the life time of giant molecular clouds (GMCs) may have important implications for models of supersonic turbulence in molecular clouds or for the relation between star…
Do molecular clouds collapse to form stars at the same rate in all environments? In large spiral galaxies, the rate of transformation of H2 into stars (hereafter SFE) varies little. However, the SFE in distant objects (z~1) is much higher…