Related papers: The dependence of stellar properties on initial cl…
The Herschel Extragalactic Legacy Project (HELP) brings together a vast range of data from many astronomical observatories. Its main focus is on the Herschel data, which maps dust obscured star formation over 1300 deg$^2$. With this…
We propose a simple theoretical model for star formation in which the local star formation rate in a galaxy is determined by three factors. First, the interplay between the interstellar radiation field and molecular self-shielding…
In this paper, the first in a series on galaxy formation before reionization, we focus on understanding what determines the size and morphology of stellar objects in the first low mass galaxies, using parsec- scale cosmological simulations…
What is the nature of a star forming clump? Observations reveal these to be chaotic environments being modified and influenced by many physical processes. However, numerical simulations often define these initial star forming clumps to be…
The stellar initial mass function (IMF) is predicted to depend upon the temperature of gas in star-forming molecular clouds. The introduction of an additional parameter, $T_{IMF}$ , into photometric template fitting, allows galaxies to be…
Star formation, together with the associated chemical and energy feedback, is one of the most important processes in galaxy evolution. The star formation activity in galaxies defines and affects many of their fundamental properties, such as…
We review recent advances in the analytical and numerical modeling of the star formation rate in molecular clouds and discuss the available observational constraints. We focus on molecular clouds as the fundamental star formation sites,…
The abundances of elements in stars are a critical clue to their origins. Observed star-to-star variations in logarithmic abundance within an open cluster are typically only $\sim 0.01-0.05$ over many elements, significantly smaller than…
Stars in galaxies form in giant molecular clouds that coalesce when the atomic hydrogen is converted into molecules. There are currently two dominant models for what property of the galactic disk determines its molecular fraction: either…
The difference in density profiles of the contributions from different density peaks to dark matter halos results in certain expectations about the Milky Way's stellar halo. We cut our simulated halo stars into two populations: those…
We use a complete sample of galaxies drawn from the SDSS to study how structure, star formation and nuclear activity depend on local density and on stellar mass. Local density is estimated by counting galaxies above a fixed absolute…
We investigate the impact of galactic environment on the properties of simulated giant molecular clouds formed in a M83-type barred spiral galaxy. Our simulation uses a rotating stellar potential to create the grand design features and…
Most stars form in highly clustered environments within molecular clouds, but eventually disperse into the distributed stellar field population. Exactly how the stellar distribution evolves from the embedded stage into gas-free associations…
We carry out a systematic investigation of the total mass density profile of massive (Mstar>2e11 Msun) early-type galaxies and its dependence on galactic properties and host halo mass with the aid of a variety of lensing/dynamical data and…
We perform a suite of hydrodynamic simulations to investigate how initial density profiles of giant molecular clouds (GMCs) affect their subsequent evolution. We find that the star formation duration and integrated star formation efficiency…
We compare the properties of clouds in simulated M33 galaxies to those observed in the real M33. We apply a friends of friends algorithm and CPROPS to identify clouds, as well as a pixel by pixel analysis. We obtain very good agreement…
The theory for the formation of the first population of stars (Pop III) predicts a IMF composed predominantly of high-mass stars, in contrast to the present-day IMF, which tends to yield stars with masses less than 1 M_Solar. The leading…
The stellar initial mass function (IMF), along with the star formation rate, is one of the fundamental properties that any theory of star formation must explain. An interesting feature of the IMF is that it appears to be remarkably…
We summarize some of the results obtained from Herschel surveys of the nearby star forming regions and the Galactic plane. We show that in the nearby star forming regions the starless core spatial surface density distribution is very…
Massive stars are very rare, but their extreme luminosities make them both the only type of young star we can observe in distant galaxies and the dominant energy sources in the universe today. They form rarely because efficient radiative…