Related papers: The Star Formation Rate in the Gravoturbulent Inte…
The surface density of the star formation rate in different galaxies, as well as in different parts of a single galaxy, scales nonlinearly with the surface density of the total gas. This observationally established relation is known as the…
We use the Arepo moving mesh code to simulate the evolution of molecular clouds exposed to a harsh environment similar to that found in the galactic center (GC), in an effort to understand why the star formation efficiency (SFE) of clouds…
Star formation is inefficient. Only a few percent of the available gas in molecular clouds forms stars, leading to the observed low star formation rate (SFR). The same holds when averaged over many molecular clouds, such that the SFR of…
Recent progress in the understanding of star formation is summarized. A consistent picture is emerging where molecular clouds form with turbulent velocity fields and clumpy substructure, imprinted already during their formation. The clouds…
It has been recently shown that molecular clouds do not exhibit a unique shape for the column density probability distribution function (Npdf). Instead, clouds without star formation seem to possess a lognormal distribution, while clouds…
Despite recent progress, the question of what regulates the star formation efficiency in galaxies remains one of the most debated problems in astrophysics. According to the dominant picture, star formation (SF) is regulated by turbulence…
Most stars in the Galaxy are believed to be formed within star clusters from collapsing molecular clouds. However, the complete process of star formation, from the parent cloud to a gas-free star cluster, is still poorly understood. We…
We develop a model for regulation of galactic star formation rates Sigma_SFR in disk galaxies, in which ISM heating by stellar UV plays a key role. By requiring simultaneous thermal and (vertical) dynamical equilibrium in the diffuse gas,…
We present results of our 1.4 GHz image stacking analysis of mass-selected galaxies in the COSMOS field. From the resulting median radio continuum flux density we have determined the evolution of the average star formation rate (SFR) of…
Understanding the star formation process is central to much of modern astrophysics. For several decades it has been thought that stellar birth is primarily controlled by the interplay between gravity and magnetostatic support, modulated by…
The inner few hundred parsecs of the Milky Way harbours gas densities, pressures, velocity dispersions, an interstellar radiation field and a cosmic ray ionisation rate orders of magnitude higher than the disc; akin to the environment found…
Stars are often observed to form in clusters. It is therefore important to understand how such a region of concentrated mass is assembled out of the diffuse medium and its properties eventually prescribe the important physical mechanisms…
How does turbulence contribute to the formation and structure of the dense interstellar medium (ISM)? Molecular clouds are dense, high-pressure objects. It is usually argued that gravitational confinement causes the high pressures, and that…
Star-forming galaxies (SFGs) display a continuous distribution of specific star formation rates (sSFR) which can be approximated by the superposition of two log-normal distributions. The 1st of these encompasses the main sequence (MS) of…
We present the results of a series of numerical simulations of compressible, self-gravitating hydrodynamic turbulence of cluster-forming clumps in molecular clouds. We examine the role that turbulence has in the formation of gravitationally…
Observations of external galaxies and of local star-forming clouds in the Milky Way have suggested a variety of star formation laws, i.e., simple direct relations between the column density of star formation (Sigma_SFR: the amount of gas…
The bathtub model of the star forming interstellar medium is based on the powerful constraint that mass has to be conserved when gas flows through its various thermal and density phases, ending up eventually in a young star or being blown…
We analyze the first giant molecular cloud (GMC) simulation to follow the formation of individual stars and their feedback from jets, radiation, winds, and supernovae, using the STARFORGE framework in the GIZMO code. We evolve the GMC for…
Star formation depends on the available gaseous "fuel" as well as galactic environment, with higher specific star formation rates where gas is predominantly molecular and where stellar (and dark matter) densities are higher. The partition…
Supercritical gas filaments in molecular clouds host the dense cores in which new stars form. The mechanisms governing their formation and subsequent gas accretion remain poorly understood. In this study, we conduct a statistical analysis…