Related papers: Star Formation
Observations suggest that star formation occurs in only one or two crossing times for a range of scales spanning a factor of 1000. These observations include (1) measurements of embedded cluster ages in comparison with the cloud core…
I briefly review recent observations of regions forming low mass stars. The discussion is cast in the form of seven questions that have been partially answered, or at least illuminated, by new data. These are the following: where do stars…
Star formation in strongly self-gravitating cloud cores should be similar at all redshifts, forming single or multiple stars with a range of masses determined by local magneto-hydrodynamics and gravity. The formation processes for these…
How stars are born from clouds of gas is a rich physics problem whose solution will inform our understanding of not just stars but also planets, galaxies, and the universe itself. Star formation is stupendously inefficient. Take the Milky…
Star formation is intimately linked to the dynamical evolution of molecular clouds. Turbulent fragmentation determines where and when protostellar cores form, and how they contract and grow in mass via accretion from the surrounding cloud…
Young galaxies are clumpy, gas-rich, and highly turbulent. Star formation appears to occur by gravitational instabilities in galactic disks. The high dispersion makes the clumps massive and the disks thick. The star formation rate should be…
In star forming regions, we can observe different evolutionary stages of various objects and phenomena such as molecular clouds, protostellar jets and outflows, circumstellar disks, and protostars. However, it is difficult to directly…
Star formation occurs in hierarchical patterns in both space and time. Galaxies form large regions on the scale of the interstellar Jeans length and these large regions apparently fragment into giant molecular clouds and cloud cores in a…
Stars form by gravoturbulent fragmentation of interstellar gas clouds. The supersonic turbulence ubiquitously observed in Galactic molecular gas generates strong density fluctuations with gravity taking over in the densest and most massive…
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 nature of the first generation of stars in the Universe remains largely unknown. Observations imply the existence of massive primordial stars early in the history of the universe, and the standard theory for the growth of cosmic…
We investigate the physical processes which lead to the formation of massive stars. Using a numerical simulation of the formation of a stellar cluster from a turbulent molecular cloud, we evaluate the relevant contributions of fragmentation…
How do stars manage to form within low-density, HI-dominated gas? Such environments provide a laboratory for studying star formation with physical conditions distinct from starbursts and the metal-rich disks of spiral galaxies where most…
From studying the cosmic microwave background, we know our Universe started out very simple. It was by and large homogeneous and isotropic, with small fluctuations that can be described by linear perturbation theory. In stark contrast, the…
Star clusters stand at the intersection of much of modern astrophysics: the interstellar medium, gravitational dynamics, stellar evolution, and cosmology. Here we review observations and theoretical models for the formation, evolution, and…
Star formation involves the flow of gas and dust within molecular clouds into protostars and young stellar objects (YSOs) due to gravity. Along the way, these flows are shaped significantly by many other mechanisms, including pressure,…
The conversion of gas into stars is a fundamental process in astrophysics and cosmology. Stars are known to form from the gravitational collapse of dense clumps in interstellar molecular clouds, and it has been proposed that the resulting…
This contribution summarizes briefly the main topics covered at this wide-ranging conference. Much of the evidence presented indicates that star formation occurs in discrete episodes or bursts that produce stellar groupings of all sizes,…
Massive stars have a profound influence on the Universe, but their formation remains poorly understood. We review the current status of observational and theoretical research in this field, describing the various stages of an evolutionary…
We describe how star formation is expected to proceed in the early metal-free Universe, focusing on the very first generations of stars. We then discuss how the star formation process may change as the effects of metallicity, external…