Related papers: Star Formation: Lessons from Taurus
We review the history and structure of star formation in the Taurus-Auriga dark clouds. Our discussion includes a summary of the macroscopic cloud properties, the population of single and binary pre-main sequence stars, the properties of…
Although the basic physics of star formation is classical, numerical simulations have yielded essential insights into how stars form. They show that star formation is a highly nonuniform runaway process characterized by the emergence of…
Our current understanding of the physical processes of star formation is reviewed, with emphasis on processes occurring in molecular clouds like those observed nearby. The dense cores of these clouds are predicted to undergo gravitational…
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…
During the last two decades, the focus of star formation research has shifted from understanding the collapse of a single dense core into a star to studying the formation hundreds to thousands of stars in molecular clouds. In this chapter,…
Stars form within molecular clouds but our understanding of this fundamental process remains hampered by the complexity of the physics that drives their evolution. We review our observational and theoretical knowledge of molecular clouds…
Recent surveys of star forming regions have shown that most stars, and probably all massive stars, are born in dense stellar clusters. The mechanism by which a molecular cloud fragments to form several hundred to thousands of individual…
The interstellar medium of galaxies is composed of multiple phases, including molecular, atomic, and ionized gas, as well as dust. Stars are formed within this medium from cold molecular gas clouds, which collapse due to their gravitational…
In this chapter we review the young stars and molecular clouds found at high Galactic latitudes $(|b| \ge 30^\circ)$. These are mostly associated with two large-scale structures on the sky, the Gould Belt and the Taurus star formation…
The formation of stellar clusters dictates the pace at which galaxies evolve, and solving the question of their formation will undoubtedly lead to a better understanding of the Universe as a whole. While it is well known that star clusters…
We suggest that molecular clouds can be formed on short time scales by compressions from large scale streams in the interstellar medium (ISM). In particular, we argue that the Taurus-Auriga complex, with filaments of 10-20 pc $\times$ 2-5…
Palla & Stahler have recently argued that star formation in Taurus and other nearby molecular clouds extends over a period of at least 10 Myr, implying quasi-static cloud evolution and star formation. Their conclusions contradict other…
The concept that stars form in the modern era began some 60 years ago with the key observation of expanding OB associations. Now we see that these associations are an intermediate scale in a cascade of hierarchical structures that begins on…
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…
Dense low mass cores in nearby clouds like Taurus and Auriga are some of the simplest sites currently forming stars like our Sun. Because of their simplicity and proximity, dense cores offer the clearest view of the different phases of star…
Stars in star clusters are thought to form in a single burst from a common progenitor cloud of molecular gas. However, massive, old globular clusters -- with ages greater than 10 billion years and masses of several hundred thousand solar…
Starless dense cores eventually collapse dynamically, which forms protostars inside them, and the physical properties of the cores determine the nature of the forming protostars. We report ALMA observations of dust continuum emission and…
One of the outstanding puzzles about star formation is why it proceeds so slowly. Giant molecular clouds convert only a few percent of their gas into stars per free-fall time, and recent observations show that this low star formation rate…
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…
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…