Related papers: Molecular Clouds (a review)
We review the properties of turbulent molecular clouds (MCs), focusing on the physical processes that influence star formation (SF). MC formation appears to occur during large-scale compression of the diffuse ISM driven by supernovae,…
The Taurus molecular cloud complex is the paradigm for quiescent, low-density, isolated star formation. Yet the age distribution of its stellar population indicates that star formation is a rapid and dynamic process, inconsistent with the…
Infrared shells and bubbles are ubiquitous in the Galaxy and can generally be associated with HII regions formed around young, massive stars. In this paper, we use high-resolution 3D SPH simulations to explore the effect of a single O7 star…
We introduce a model for the large-scale, global 3D structure of molecular clouds. Motivated by the morphological appearance of clouds in surface density maps, we model clouds as cylinders, with the aim of backing out information about the…
We investigate star formation at very early evolutionary phases in five massive clouds in the inner 500 pc of the Galaxy, the Central Molecular Zone. Using interferometer observations of H$_2$O masers and ultra-compact H II regions, we find…
The dynamical processes that control star formation in molecular clouds are not well understood, and in particular, it is unclear if rotation plays a major role in cloud evolution. We investigate the importance of rotation in cloud…
Using 3D MHD simulation with the effects of radiative cooling/heating, chemical reactions, and thermal conduction, we investigate the formation of molecular cloud in the ISM. We consider the formation of molecular cloud by accretion of the…
We explore, through a simplified, semi-analytic model, the formation of dense clusters containing massive stars. The parent cloud spawning the cluster is represented as an isothermal sphere. This sphere is in near force balance between…
Giant molecular clouds (GMCs) are the primary reservoirs of cold, star-forming molecular gas in the Milky Way and similar galaxies, and thus any understanding of star formation must encompass a model for GMC formation, evolution, and…
Here we model a star forming factory in which the continuous creation of stars results in a highly concentrated, massive (globular cluster-like) stellar system. We show that under very general conditions a large-scale gravitational…
Many questions in physical cosmology regarding the thermal history of the intergalactic medium, chemical enrichment, reionization, etc. are thought to be intimately related to the nature and evolution of pregalactic structure. In particular…
The most recent observational evidence seems to indicate that giant molecular clouds are predominantly gravitationally unbound objects. In this paper we show that this is a natural consequence of a scenario in which cloud-cloud collisions…
Stars are usually formed in clusters in the dense cores of molecular clouds. These embedded clusters show a wide variety of morphologies from hierarchical clusters with substructure to centrally condensed ones. Often they are elongated and…
Recent studies of the nearest star-forming clouds of the Galaxy at submillimeter wavelengths with the Herschel Space Observatory have provided us with unprecedented images of the initial and boundary conditions of the star formation…
The conversion of gas into stars is a fundamental process in astrophysics and cosmology. Stars are known to form from the gravitational collapse of dense clumps in interstellar molecular clouds, and it has been proposed that the resulting…
Molecular Cloud Complexes (MCCs) are highly structured and ``turbulent''. Observational evidence suggests that MCCs are dynamically dominated systems, rather than quasi-equilibrium entities. The observed structure is more likely a…
On galactic scales, the surface density of star formation appears to be well correlated with the surface density of molecular gas. This has lead many authors to suggest that there exists a causal relationship between the chemical state of…
In an exploration of the birthplaces of globular clusters, we present a careful examination of the formation of self-gravitating gas clouds within assembling dark matter haloes in a hierarchical cosmological model. Our high-resolution…
To understand the formation of stellar groups, one must first document carefully the birth pattern within real clusters and associations. In this study of Taurus-Auriga, we combine pre-main-sequence ages from our own evolutionary tracks…
Recent surveys of star forming regions have shown that most stars, and probably all massive stars, are born in dense stellar clusters. The mechanism by which a molecular cloud fragments to form several hundred to thousands of individual…