Related papers: Radiation Feedback and Fragmentation in Massive Pr…
The formation of massive stars is currently an unsolved problems in astrophysics. Understanding the formation of massive stars is essential because they dominate the luminous, kinematic, and chemical output of stars. Furthermore, their…
It has been proposed that some hot molecular cores (HMCs) harbor a young embedded massive star, which heats an infalling envelope and accretes mass at a rate high enough to ``choke off'' an incipient HII region. This class of HMCs would…
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…
A model for massive stars is constructed by piecing together evolutionary algorithms for the protostellar structure, the environment, the inflow and the radiation feedback. We investigate specified accretion histories of constant,…
Stars form from the gravitational collapse of dense molecular cloud cores. In the protostellar phase, mass accretes from the core onto a protostar, likely through an accretion disk, and it is during this phase that the initial masses of…
The formation of massive stars may take place at relatively low accretion rates over a long period of time if the accretion can continue past the onset of core hydrogen ignition. The accretion may continue despite the formation of an…
Protostellar feedback, both radiation and bipolar outflows, dramatically affects the fragmentation and mass accretion from star-forming cores. We use ORION, an adaptive mesh refinement gravito-radiation-hydrodynamics code, to simulate the…
Massive star formation requires the accretion of gas at high rate while the star is already bright. Its actual luminosity depends sensitively on the stellar structure. We compute pre-main-sequence tracks for massive and intermediate-mass…
We present numerical investigations into the formation of massive stars from centrally condensed turbulent cores. The results of five hydrodynamical simulations are described, following the collapse of the core, fragmentation and the…
Our knowledge of the initial conditions and early stages of high mass star formation is very limited. We will review recent surveys of regions in the early stages of massive star formation using molecular tracers of high density and dust…
We describe how star formation is expected to proceed in the early metal-free Universe, focusing on the very first generations of stars. We then discuss how the star formation process may change as the effects of metallicity, external…
Stellar feedback in the form of radiation pressure and magnetically-driven collimated outflows may limit the maximum mass that a star can achieve and affect the star-formation efficiency of massive pre-stellar cores. Here we present a…
We calculate the evolution of cloud cores embedded in different envelopes to investigate environmental effects on the mass accretion rate onto protostars. As the initial state, we neglect the magnetic field and cloud rotation, and adopt…
The origin of supermassive black holes is an open question that has been explored considering gas- and collision-based formation channels to explain the high number of quasars observed in the early Universe. According to numerical…
This chapter reviews progress in the field of massive star formation. It focuses on evidence for accretion and current models that invoke high accretion rates. In particular it is noted that high accretion rates will cause the massive young…
I compare theoretical models of massive star formation with observations of the Orion Hot Core, which harbors one of the closest massive protostars. Although this region is complicated, many of its features (size, luminosity, accretion…
In this review, I present the case for how massive stars may form through stellar collisions. This mechanism requires very high stellar densities, up to 4 orders of magnitude higher than are observed in the cores of dense young clusters. In…
Observations of pre-/proto-stellar cores in young star-forming regions show them to be mass segregated, i.e. the most massive cores are centrally concentrated, whereas pre-main sequence stars in the same star-forming regions (and older…
How massive were the first stars? This question is of fundamental importance for galaxy formation and cosmic reionization. Here we consider how protostellar feedback can limit the mass of a forming star. For this we must understand the rate…
Young stars are expected to gain most of their mass by accretion from a disk that forms around them as a result of angular momentum conservation in the collapsing protostellar cloud. Accretion initially proceeds at high rates of…