相关论文: The IMF and its Evolution

The stellar initial mass function (IMF), along with the star formation rate, is one of the fundamental properties that any theory of star formation must explain. An interesting feature of the IMF is that it appears to be remarkably…

Much of our knowledge of galaxies comes from analysing the radiation emitted by their stars. It depends on the stellar initial mass function (IMF) describing the distribution of stellar masses when the population formed. Consequently…

Observations have not yielded convincing results concerning the form of the stellar initial mass function (IMF) or its variations in space and time, so it is proposed that theoretical models may provide useful guidance. Several classes of…

The stellar initial mass function (IMF) is predicted to depend upon the temperature of gas in star-forming molecular clouds. The introduction of an additional parameter, $T_{IMF}$ , into photometric template fitting, allows galaxies to be…

It is suggested that the thermal physics of star-forming clouds may play a more important role than has usually been recognized in the origin of the stellar IMF and in determining a characteristic mass scale. The importance of the thermal…

The origin of the stellar initial mass function (IMF) is a fundamental issue in the theory of star formation. It is generally fit with a composite power law. Some clues on the progenitors can be found in dense starless cores that have a…

(abridged) The case can be made for a rather universal stellar IMF form that can be approximated by a two-part power-law function in the stellar regime. However, there exists a possible hint for a systematic variation with metallicity. A…

The stellar mass distribution in star-forming regions, stellar clusters and associations, the Initial Mass Function (IMF), appears to be invariant across different star-forming environments, and is consistent with the IMF observed in the…

Statistical sampling from the stellar initial mass function (IMF) for all star-forming regions in the Galaxy would lead to the prediction of ~1000 Msun stars unless there is a rapid turn-down in the IMF beyond several hundred solar masses.…

Does the IMF vary? Is it significantly different in metal-rich environments than in metal-poor ones? Theoretical work predicts this to be the case. But in order to provide robust empirical evidence for this, the researcher must understand…

The thermal properties of star-forming clouds have an important influence on how they fragment into stars, and it is suggested in this paper that the low-mass stellar IMF, which appears to be almost universal, is determined largely by the…

The stellar initial mass function (IMF) is a fundamental astrophysical quantity that impacts a wide range of astrophysical problems from heavy element distribution to galactic evolution to planetary system formation. However, the origin and…

We investigate how different stellar initial mass functions (IMFs) can affect the mass loss and survival of star clusters. We find that IMFs with radically different low-mass cut-offs (between 0.1 and 2 Msun) do not change cluster…

Any predictive theory of star formation must explain observed variations (or lack thereof) in the initial mass function. Recent work suggests that we might expect quantitative variations in the IMF as a function of metallicity (Larson 2005)…

The combination of a finite time-scale for star formation, rapid early stellar evolution and rapid stellar-dynamical processes imply that the stellar IMF cannot be inferred for any star cluster independently of its age (the Cluster IMF…

Observed variations in the IMF are reviewed with an emphasis on environmental density. The remote field IMF studied in the LMC by several authors is clearly steeper than most cluster IMFs, which have slopes close to the Salpeter value.…

The characteristic mass M_c and slope Gamma of the IMF are reviewed for clusters, field regions, galaxies, and regions formed during cosmological times. Local star formation has a somewhat uniform M_c and Gamma. Statistical variations in…

The stellar initial mass function (IMF) determines the relative number of stars born at a given mass. Despite the tremendous effort to establish a universal IMF, the astronomical literature offers a wealth of diverse evidence for IMF…

The theory for the formation of the first population of stars (Pop III) predicts an initial mass function (IMF) dominated by high-mass stars, in contrast to the present-day IMF, which tends to yield mostly stars with masses less than 1…

Recent results on the non-universality of the Initial Mass Function (IMF) have shown strong evidence of IMF variations with galaxy velocity dispersion, with a corresponding impact on other stellar population parameters, line indices and…