Related papers: Downsizing of Star-Forming Galaxies by Gravitation…
Star clusters form in dense, hierarchically collapsing gas clouds. Bulk kinetic energy is transformed to turbulence with stars forming from cores fed by filaments. In the most compact regions, stellar feedback is least effective in removing…
According to the hierarchical model, small galaxies form first and merge together to form bigger objects. In parallel, galaxies assemble their mass through accretion from cosmic filaments. Recently, the increased spatial resolution of the…
In hierarchical models of galaxy formation, ellipticals form from the merging of disk galaxies drawn together by gravity as their surrounding dark halos coalesce. Using semi-analytic techniques, we are able to follow the merging, star…
We combine Spitzer 24micron observations with data from the COMBO-17 survey for ~15,000 0.2<z<1 galaxies to determine how the average star formation rates (SFR) have evolved for galaxy sub-populations of different stellar masses. In the…
The globally-averaged star formation rate in the Universe has been steadily declining since at least z~1. This may be due either to very local processes operating within the average galaxy, or to external, environmental effects.…
High resolution gravity plus smoothed particle hydrodynamics simulations are used to study the formation of galaxies within the context of hierarchical structure formation. The simulations have sufficient dynamic range to resolve from ten…
Faber-Jackson and Tully-Fisher scaling relations for elliptical and spiral galaxy samples up to z=1 provide evidence for a differential behaviour of galaxy evolution with mass. In compliance with the downsizing scenario, the stellar…
Massive galaxies, such as nearby ellipticals, have relatively low number densities, yet they host the majority of the stellar mass in the universe. Understanding their origin is a central problem of galaxy formation. Age dating of stellar…
The empirical laws of star formation suggest that galactic-scale gravity is involved, but they do not identify the actual triggering mechanisms for clusters in the final stages. Many other triggering processes satisfy the empirical laws…
The formation of the first galaxies at redshifts z ~ 10-15 signaled the transition from the simple initial state of the universe to one of ever increasing complexity. We here review recent progress in understanding their assembly process…
Understanding star formation is problematic as it originates in the large scale dynamics of a galaxy but occurs on the small scale of an individual star forming event. This paper presents the first numerical simulations to resolve the star…
Galaxy growth depends critically on the interplay between radiative cooling of cosmic gas and the resulting energetic feedback that cooling triggers. This interplay has proven exceedingly difficult to model, even with large supercomputer…
Large self-gravitating stellar systems share with correlated liquids in condensed matter physics a pattern of hierarchical density variations. While it takes the microscopic time resolution to discern the correlated dynamics of the critical…
Over the past decade increasingly robust estimates of the dense molecular gas content in galaxy populations between redshift 0 and the peak of cosmic galaxy/star formation from redshift 1-3 have become available. This rapid progress has…
The 5 independent correlations between the properties of galaxies observed outside big clusters must set such strong constraints on any theory of galaxy formation that it is hard to imagine any but the right one passing muster; certainly…
Galaxies can be classified in two broad sequences which are likely to reflect their formation mechanism. The `main sequence', consisting of spirals, irregulars and all dwarf galaxies, is probably produced by gas settling within dark matter…
Recent studies of galaxies ~2-3 Gyr after the Big Bang have revealed large, turbulent rotating systems. The existence of well-ordered rotation in galaxies during this peak epoch of cosmic star formation may suggest that gas accretion…
A review of gravitational and hydrodynamical processes during formation of clusters and evolution of galaxies is given. Early, at the advent of N-body computer simulations, the importance of tidal fields in galaxy encounters has been…
Spiral galaxies have most of their stellar mass in a large rotating disk, and only a modest fraction in a central spheroidal bulge. This poses a major challenge for cosmological models of galaxy formation. Galaxies form at the centre of…
Star-forming clumps dominate the rest-frame ultraviolet morphology of galaxies at the peak of cosmic star formation. If turbulence driven fragmentation is the mechanism responsible for their formation, we expect their stellar mass function…