Statistics – Computation
Scientific paper
Mar 1996
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1996mnras.279..121b&link_type=abstract
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Vol. 279, 121-128
Statistics
Computation
17
Computational Astrophysics, Hydrodynamics, Interstellar Gas, Interstellar Matter, Pre-Main Sequence Stars, Protostars, Star Formation, Stellar Envelopes
Scientific paper
Since the initial conditions for star formation are difficult to ascertain from either observations or theories of molecular clouds, we investigate how the protostellar envelopes that form around young stars depend on the initial conditions for gravitational collapse. For prolate clouds, the evolution depends primarily on whether the cloud's minor axis, Rmin, is smaller or larger than the Jeans radius, RJ, the minimum radius to be gravitationally bound. Clouds containing few Jeans masses (especially those that are centrally condensed) have Rmin < RJ and thus collapse preferentially along the major axis, forcing the cloud to become oblate. Alternatively, clouds containing many Jeans masses have Rmin > RJ and therefore collapse preferentially along their minor axis, thus increasing their axial ratio and becoming more prolate. When collapse occurs preferentially along the major axis, a large-scale (up to 10^4 au) flattened disc-like structure results as the infalling matter shocks in the equatorial plane. This pseudo-disc forms solely due to the hydrodynamical processes and without either magnetic fields or rotation. Based on these results, we deduce that the presence of prolate envelopes around young stars implies that they were formed from initial conditions involving many Jeans masses and were thus far from virial equilibrium. Initial conditions of this sort require a dynamical formation mechanism.
Bate Matthew R.
Bonnell Ian A.
Price Nigel M.
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