Related papers: Symmetries, magnetic fields, and the shape of mole…
(Abridged) We develop an analytical spectral method to solve the equations of equilibrium for a self-gravitating, magnetized fluid body, under the only hypotheses that (a) the equation of state is isothermal, (b) the configuration is…
We formulate the problem of the formation and collapse of nonaxisymmetric protostellar cores in weakly ionized, self-gravitating, magnetic molecular clouds. In our formulation, molecular clouds are approximated as isothermal, thin (but with…
Numerical solutions of the isothermal Lane-Emden equation are presented, corresponding to self-gravitating gaseous cores embedded within a finite density envelope of overall cylindrical symmetry. These structures may be members of a…
The structure of molecular cloud cores supported by thermal pressure and a poloidal magnetic field is reinvestigated in the magnetohydrostatic and axisymmetric approximation. In addition to oblate configurations found in earlier work,…
Following an approach initially outlined by McKee & Holliman, we investigate the structure and stability of dense, starless molecular cloud cores. We model those as spherical clouds in hydrostatic equilibrium and supported against gravity…
We find exact and explicit solutions of the axisymmetric MHD equations of a self-gravitating polytropic gas. These solutions are able to describe a flat (uniform density) subsonic internal core, contracting homologously, of a collapsing…
Molecular-line observations of star-forming cloud cores indicate that they are not the flattened structures traditionally considered by theory. Rather, they are elongated, perhaps in the direction of their internal magnetic field. We are…
We investigate the equilibrium properties of self-gravitating magnetized clouds with polytropic equations of state with negative index n. In particular, we consider scale-free isopedic configurations that have constant dimensionless…
We study magnetic vortex-like solutions lying on the spherical surface. The simplest cylindrically symmetric vortex presents two cores (instead of one, like in open surfaces) with same charge, so repealing each other. However, the net…
In this paper, we review some of the properties of dense molecular cloud cores. The results presented here rely on three-dimensional numerical simulations of isothermal, magnetized, turbulent, and self-gravitating molecular clouds (MCs) in…
We generalize the classic Bonnor-Ebert stability analysis of pressure-truncated, self-gravitating gas spheres, to include clouds with arbitrary equations of state. A virial-theorem analysis is also used to incorporate mean magnetic fields…
We present the exact solutions for the collapse of a spherically-symmetric, cold (i.e., pressureless) cloud under its own self-gravity, valid for arbitrary initial density profiles and not restricted to the realm of self-similarity. These…
In this study, we investigate the shapes of starless and protostellar cores using hydrodynamic, self-gravitating adaptive mesh refinement simulations of turbulent molecular clouds. We simulate observations of these cores in dust emission,…
Rotating magnetic structures are common in astrophysics, from vortex tubes and tornados in the Sun all the way to jets in different astrophysical systems. The physics of these objects often combine inertial, magnetic, gas pressure and…
We study the linear evolution of small perturbations in self-gravitating fluid systems with magnetic fields. We consider wave-like perturbations to nonuniform filamentary and sheet-like hydrostatic equilibria in the presence of a uniform…
Theoretically, stars have been formed from the collapse of cores in the molecular clouds. Historically, the core had been assumed as an singular isothermal sphere (SIS), and the collapse had been investigated by a self-similar manner. This…
The self-similar equilibrium models of self-gravitating, rotating, isothermal systems are investigated analytically. In these models the rotation velocity is constant and the density varies as $\frac{f(\theta, \phi)}{r^2}$, where $r$ and…
We develop a detailed chemical model for the starless cores of strongly magnetized molecular clouds, with the ambipolar diffusion-driven dynamic evolution of the clouds coupled to the chemistry through ion abundances. We concentrate on two…
Observations of magnetic field strengths imply that molecular cloud fragments are individually close to being in a magnetically critical state, even though both magnetic field and column density measurements range over two orders of…
Molecular clouds are sites of star formation. Magnetic fields are believed to play an important role in their dynamics and shaping morphology. We aim to study any possible correlation that might exist between the magnetic fields orientation…