Related papers: Thermal Regulation and the Star-Forming Main Seque…
Star formation in galaxies is regulated by the heating and cooling in the interstellar medium. In particular, the processing of molecular gas into stars will depend strongly on the ratio of gas heating to gas cooling in the neutral gas…
The problem of galaxy formation and its dependence on thermodynamic properties is addressed by using Eulerian hydrodynamic numerical simulations of large scale structure formation. Global galaxy properties are explored in simulations…
We review current understanding of star formation, outlining an overall theoretical framework and the observations that motivate it. A conception of star formation has emerged in which turbulence plays a dual role, both creating…
Observations show that star formation in galaxies is closely correlated with the abundance of molecular hydrogen. Modeling this empirical relation from first principles proves challenging, however, and many questions regarding its…
We report the stellar mass functions obtained from 20 radiation hydrodynamical simulations of star cluster formation in 500 M$_\odot$ molecular clouds with metallicities of 3, 1, 1/10 and 1/100 of the solar value, with the clouds subjected…
Determination of the star formation rate can be done using mid-IR photometry or Balmer line luminosity after a proper correction for extinction effects. Both methods show convergent results while those based on UV or on [OII]3727…
Observations have not yielded convincing results concerning the form of the stellar initial mass function (IMF) or its variations in space and time, so it is proposed that theoretical models may provide useful guidance. Several classes of…
Using a cosmological galactic evolutionary approach to model the Milky Way, we calculate the star formation history (SFH) of the solar neighborhood. The good agreement we obtain with the observational inferences suggests that our physical…
The evolution of the galaxy stellar mass--star formation rate relationship (M*-SFR) provides key constraints on the stellar mass assembly histories of galaxies. For star-forming galaxies, M*-SFR is observed to be fairly tight with a slope…
We study the galactic-scale triggering of star formation. We find that the largest mass-scale not stabilized by rotation, a well defined quantity in a rotating system and with clear dynamical meaning, strongly correlates with the star…
We discuss how the conditions at high redshift differ from those at low redshift, and what the impact is on the galaxy population. We focus in particular on the role of gaseous dissipation and its impact on sustaining high star formation…
The pressure exerted by massive stars' radiation fields is an important mechanism regulating their formation. Detailed simulation of massive star formation therefore requires an accurate treatment of radiation. However, all published…
Cosmic rays (CRs) control the thermal, ionization and chemical state of the dense H_2 gas regions that otherwise remain shielded from far-UV and optical stellar radiation propagating through the dusty ISM of galaxies. It is in such…
Motivated by the WMAP results indicating an early epoch of reionization, we consider alternative cosmic star formation models which are capable of reionizing the early intergalactic medium. We develop models which include an early burst of…
Using cosmological galaxy simulations from the MaGICC project, we study the evolution of the stellar masses, star formation rates and gas phase abundances of star forming galaxies. We derive the stellar masses and star formation rates using…
Galaxy evolution depends strongly on the physics of the interstellar medium (ISM). Motivated by the need to incorporate the properties of the ISM in cosmological simulations we construct a simple method to include the contribution of…
(ABBREVIATED) Understanding the formation of stars in galaxies is central to much of modern astrophysics. In this review the relation between interstellar turbulence and star formation is discussed. Supersonic turbulence can provide support…
The first stars are expected to form through molecular-hydrogen (H$_2$) cooling, a channel that is especially sensitive to the thermal and ionization state of gas, and can thus act as a probe of exotic energy injection from decaying or…
Observations of the interstellar medium are key to deciphering the physical processes regulating star formation in galaxies. However, observational uncertainties and detection limits can bias the interpretation unless carefully modeled.…
Understanding star formation is problematic as it originates in the large scale dynamics of a galaxy but occurs on the small scale of an individual star forming event. This paper presents the first numerical simulations to resolve the star…