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| EPoS Contribution |
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The Missing Link - Connecting Massive Stars to their Progenitor Cores
Rowan J. | |
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| The earliest stages of massive star formation remain a controversial unknown in our theories of star formation. In this talk I shall use SPH simulations of a Giant Molecular Cloud to trace the link between the earliest pre-stellar cores and massive stars in a clustered environment. No massive pre-stellar cores are found in the simulation, even when a simple model of feedback is included. Instead massive stars form from intermediate mass pre-stellar cores, and become massive through accretion. This accretion process is intrinsically linked to the proto-cluster within which the massive stars are forming, as it is the larger proto-clusters gravitational potential that channels gas towards the central protostars where it can be accreted. The formation of a massive star is therefore dependent on not only the progenitor core, as is often assumed, but the entire cluster environment. Further, in these simulations, it is found that massive stars proto-stellar cores have radially non-uniform density distributions. Therefore, accretion tends to proceed through non-uniform streams, alongside which there are pre-existing channels which radiation could escape through. This increases the difficulty in stopping accretion by feedback. | |
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| Caption: The final fate of the mass within a region where a Massive Star forms. The green dots show the positions of gas which will later be accreted by the massive sink (red dot). Black dots show the position of sinks (representing stars) and blue dots show the location of material in cores. The gas which will be accreted by the massive sink is well distributed throughout the region, and is not confined to an individual core. Lower mass cores also exist within this region and will not be disrupted by the accretion onto the massive sink. | |
| Collaborators: I.A. Bonnell, Univ. of St-Andrews, Scotland P.C Clark, Univ. Heidelberg, Germany S. Longmore, CFA, USA |
Key publication
Suggested Session: Massive Stars, Cores and Collapse, Molecular Clouds |