Related papers: How Galactic Environment affects the Dynamical Sta…
To date, most numerical simulations of molecular clouds, and star formation within them, assume a uniform density sphere or box with an imposed turbulent velocity field. In this work, we select molecular clouds from galactic scale…
Star formation is inefficient. Recent advances in numerical simulations and theoretical models of molecular clouds show that the combined effects of interstellar turbulence, magnetic fields and stellar feedback can explain the low…
In this letter we present, for the first time, a study of star formation rate, gas fraction and galaxy morphology of a constrained simulation of the Milky Way (MW) and Andromeda (M31) galaxies, compared to other MW-mass galaxies. By…
We analyse extinction maps of nearby Giant Molecular Clouds to forge a link between driving processes of turbulence and modes of star formation. Our investigation focuses on cloud structure in the column density range above the self…
Observations of both star-forming regions and young, gas-free stellar associations indicate that most nearby molecular clouds form stars only over a short time span before dispersal; large-scale flows in the diffuse interstellar medium have…
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…
We examine the role of the large-scale galactic-dynamical environment in setting the properties of giant molecular clouds in Milky Way-like galaxies. We perform three high-resolution simulations of Milky Way-like discs with the moving-mesh…
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…
To investigate how molecular clouds react to different environmental conditions at a galactic scale, we present a catalogue of giant molecular clouds resolved down to masses of $\sim 10$~M$_{\odot}$ from a simulation of the entire disc of…
All stars are born in molecular clouds, and most in giant molecular clouds (GMCs), which thus set the star formation activity of galaxies. We first review their observed properties, including measures of mass surface density, Sigma, and…
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…
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 strong time-dependence of the dynamics of galactic bars yields a complex and rapidly evolving distribution of dense gas and star forming regions. Although bars mainly host regions void of any star formation activity, their extremities…
Star formation on galactic scales is known to be a slow process, but whether it is slow on smaller scales is uncertain. We cross-correlate 5469 giant molecular clouds (GMCs) from a new all-sky catalog with 256 star forming complexes (SFCs)…
We explore the relation between the stellar mass surface density and the mass surface density of molecular hydrogen gas in twelve nearby molecular clouds that are located at $<$1.5 kpc distance. The sample clouds span an order of magnitude…
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…
We describe a numerical implementation of star formation in disk galaxies, in which the conversion of cooling gas to stars in the multiphase interstellar medium is governed by the rate at which molecular clouds are formed and destroyed. In…
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…
It is speculated that the high star-formation efficiency observed in spiral-arm molecular clouds is linked to the prevalence of compressive (curl-free) turbulent modes, while the shear-driven solenoidal (divergence-free) modes appear to be…
We investigate how the properties of Galactic giant molecular clouds (GMCs) and their denser substructures (clumps) correlate with the local star formation rate. We trace clouds using the $^{12}$CO(3-2) transition, as observed by the CO…