Related papers: Ring Formation in Magnetically Subcritical Clouds …
We review theoretical models of the early stages of star formation, in which gravitational collapse is strongly regulated by magnetic fields and the associated process of ambipolar diffusion. We discuss results of numerical simulations and…
We present high resolution interferometric and single dish observations of molecular gas in the Serpens cluster-forming core. Star formation does not appear to be homogeneous throughout the core, but is localised in spatially- and…
Super-sonic turbulence fragments molecular clouds (MC) into a very complex density field with density contrasts of several orders of magnitude. A fraction of the gas is locked into dense and gravitationally bound cores, which collapse as…
The efficiency of star formation, defined as the ratio of the stellar to total (gas and stellar) mass, is observed to vary from a few percent in regions of dispersed star formation to about a third in cluster-forming cores. This difference…
Supersonic turbulence plays a dual role in molecular clouds: On one hand, it contributes to the global support of the clouds, while on the other it promotes the formation of small-scale density fluctuations, identifiable with clumps and…
In the present-day universe, magnetic fields play such essential roles in star formation as angular momentum transport and outflow driving, which control circumstellar disc formation/fragmentation and also the star formation efficiency.…
We obtain self-similar solutions that describe the gravitational collapse of nonrotating, isothermal, magnetic molecular cloud cores. We use simplifying assumptions but explicitly include the induction equation, and the semianalytic…
We investigate the formation of circumstellar disks and outflows subsequent to the collapse of molecular cloud cores with the magnetic field and turbulence. Numerical simulations are performed by using an adaptive mesh refinement to follow…
Linear analysis of the formation of protostellar cores in planar magnetic interstellar clouds shows that molecular clouds exhibit a preferred length scale for collapse that depends on the mass-to-flux ratio and neutral-ion collision time…
Disks are essential to the formation of both stars and planets, but how they form in magnetized molecular cloud cores remains debated. This work focuses on how the disk formation is affected by turbulence and ambipolar diffusion (AD), both…
A non-ideal MHD collapse calculation employing the axisymmetric thin-disk approximation is used to resolve cloud core collapse down to the scales of the second (stellar) core. Rotation and a magnetic braking torque are included in the…
Recent observations of molecular clouds around rich massive star clusters including NGC3603, Westerlund 2, and M20 revealed that the formation of massive stars could be triggered by a cloud-cloud collision. By using three-dimensional,…
We formulate the problem of the formation and subsequent evolution of fragments (or cores) in magnetically-supported, self-gravitating molecular clouds in two spatial dimensions. The six-fluid (neutrals, electrons, molecular and atomic…
This paper re-examines the problem of ambipolar diffusion as a mechanism for the production and runaway evolution of centrally condensed molecular cloud cores, a process that has been termed the gravomagneto catastrophe. Our calculation…
We present a unified model for molecular core formation and evolution, based on numerical simulations of converging, supersonic flows. Our model applies to star formation in GMCs dominated by large-scale turbulence, and contains four main…
Dense, star-forming, cores of molecular clouds are observed to be significantly magnetized. A realistic magnetic field of moderate strength has been shown to suppress, through catastrophic magnetic braking, the formation of a rotationally…
Using hydrodynamic simulations we investigate the time evolution and fragmentation of regions within molecular clouds which have lost their turbulent support leading to gravitational contraction. The initial density distributions are…
For a molecular cloud clump to form stars some transport of magnetic flux is required from the denser, inner regions to the outer regions of the cloud, otherwise this can prevent the collapse. Fast magnetic reconnection which takes place in…
Stars generally form faster than the ambipolar diffusion time, suggesting that several processes short circuit the delay and promote a rapid collapse. These processes are considered here, including turbulence compression in the outer parts…
The collapse of dense cores with different metallicities is studied by hydrodynamical calculations coupled with detailed chemical and radiative processes. For this purpose, we construct a simple chemical network with non-equilibrium…