Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astrophysics
Scientific paper
2004-03-10
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astrophysics
8 pages, invited contribution for the Cancun Workshop on Formation and Evolution of Young Massive Clusters, eds. H. J. G. L. M
Scientific paper
Young star clusters with masses similar to those of classical old globular clusters are observed not only in starbursts, mergers or otherwise disturbed galaxies, but also in normal spiral galaxies. Some young clusters with masses as high as ~10^6 Msun have been found in the disks of isolated spirals. Dynamical mass estimates are available for a few of these clusters and are consistent with Kroupa-type IMFs. The luminosity (and possibly mass-) functions of young clusters are usually well approximated by power-laws. Thus, massive clusters at the tail of the distribution are naturally rare, but appear to be present whenever clusters form in large numbers. While bound star clusters may generally form with a higher efficiency in environments of high star formation rate, many of the apparent differences between clusters in starbursts and ``normal'' galaxies might be simply due to sampling effects.
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