Related papers: Turbulent Fragmentation and Star Formation
Developing a theory of low-mass star formation ($\sim 0.1$ to 3~M$_{\odot}$) remains one of the most elusive and important goals of theoretical astrophysics. The star-formation process is the outcome of the complex dynamics of interstellar…
Young stars form on a wide range of scales, producing aggregates and clusters with various degrees of gravitational self-binding. The loose aggregates have a hierarchical structure in both space and time that resembles interstellar…
We simulate fragmentation and gravitational collapse of cold, magnetized molecular clouds. We explore the nonlinear development of an instability mediated by ambipolar diffusion, in which the collapse rate is intermediate to fast…
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 analyse extinction maps of nearby Giant Molecular Clouds to forge a link between driving processes of turbulence and modes of star formation. Our investigation focuses on cloud structure in the column density range above the self…
Properties of candidate stars, forming out of molecular clouds, depend on the ambient conditions of the parent cloud. We present a series of 2D and 3D simulations of fragmentation of molecular clouds in starburst regions as well as clouds…
Early type massive stars drive thin, dense shells whose edges often show evidence of star-formation. The possibility of fragmentation of these shells, leading to the formation of putative star-forming clumps is examined with the aid of…
Almost all young stars are found in multiple systems. This suggests that protostellar cores almost always fragment into multiple objects. The observed properties of multiple systems such as their separation distribution and mass ratios…
Sheet-like clouds are common in turbulent gas and perhaps form via collisions between turbulent gas flows. Having examined the evolution of an isothermal shocked slab in an earlier contribution, in this work we follow the evolution of a…
We discuss the factors influencing the formation and gravitational fragmentation of protostellar discs. We start with a review of how observations of prestellar cores can be analysed statistically to yield plausible initial conditions for…
The remarkably filamentary spatial distribution of young stars in the Taurus molecular cloud has significant implications for understanding low-mass star formation in relatively quiescent conditions. The large scale and regular spacing of…
Stars and star clusters 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…
We discuss the induced star formation in dense walls of expanding shells. The fragmentation process is studied using the linear perturbation theory. The influence of the energy input, the ISM distribution and the ISM speed of sound is…
[Abridged] Star and planet formation are the complex outcomes of gravitational collapse and angular momentum transport mediated by protostellar and protoplanetary disks. In this review we focus on the role of gravitational instability in…
The kinetic energy of supersonic turbulence within interstellar clouds is subject to cooling by dissipation in shocks and subsequent line radiation. The clouds are therefore susceptible to a condensation process controlled by the specific…
A fundamental assumption in our understanding of disks is that when the Toomre Q>>1, the disk is stable against fragmentation into self-gravitating objects (and so cannot form planets via direct collapse). But if disks are turbulent, this…
Momentum deposition by radiation pressure from young, massive stars may help to destroy molecular clouds and unbind stellar clusters by driving large-scale outflows. We extend our previous numerical radiation hydrodynamic study of…
Understanding the physical properties of star-forming cores as mass reservoirs for protostars, and the impact of turbulence, is crucial in star formation studies. We implemented passive tracer particles in clump-scale numerical simulations…
Turbulence is thought to be a primary driving force behind the early stages of star formation. In this framework large, self gravitating, turbulent clouds fragment into smaller clouds which in turn fragment into even smaller ones. At the…
Recently, we have shown that if the ISM is governed by super-sonic turbulent flows, the excursion-set formalism can be used to calculate the statistics of self-gravitating objects over a wide range of scales. On the largest self-gravitating…