2000/11/11 by Paolo Padoan, AAke Nordlund, Aake Nordlund +7
Physics and Astronomy · #Astro and Planetary Science #Astrophysics (astro-ph) #Astrophysics and Star Formation Studies #FOS: Physical sciences #Solar and Space Plasma Dynamics #astro-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.astro-ph/0011229
15 pages, 5 figures, submitted to ApJ
arxiv created 2000/11/11 · openalex publication_date 2000/11/11 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Super-sonic turbulence fragments molecular clouds (MC) into a very complex density field with density contrasts of several orders of magnitude. A fraction of the gas is locked into dense and gravitationally bound cores, which collapse as proto-stars. This process can be studied with numerical simulations of super-sonic self-gravitating turbulence. In this work, we use numerical simulations of magneto-hydrodynamic (MHD), super-sonic, super-Alfvénic and self-gravitating turbulence to compute the mass distribution of collapsing proto-stellar cores, which are selected as local density maxima. We find that the mass distribution of collapsing cores is consistent with the stellar initial mass function (IMF), suggesting that super-sonic turbulence may be responsible for the generation of the IMF. To support this conclusion we also show that the physical properties of the numerically selected cores are in agreement with the properties of observed NH3 cores and that their magnetic field strength is consistent with Zeeman splitting measurements. In turbulent MCs, star formation occurs via the gravitational collapse of super-critical cores, formed by the turbulent flow, sub-critical cores being irrelevant for the process of star formation.