2005/03/07 by Paul C. Clark, Ian A. Bonnell, Hans Zinnecker +1 · 8 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Astronomy and Astrophysical Research #Astrophysics and Star Formation Studies #Galaxies: Formation, Evolution, Phenomena #Kinetic energy #Molecular cloud #Protostar #Star (game theory) #Star cluster #Star formation #astro-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1111/j.1365-2966.2005.08942.x
published as Mon.Not.Roy.Astron.Soc.359:809-818,2005 · 11 pages, 5 figures, Accepted for publication in MNRAS. The authors would like to dedicate this paper to Adriaan Blaauw, on the occasion of his 90th birthday
arxiv created 2005/03/07 · openalex publication_date 2005/05/01 · arxiv updated 2014/10/13 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
We investigate the formation of star clusters in an unbound giant molecular cloud, where the supporting kinetic energy is twice as large as the cloud's self-gravity. This cloud manages to form a series of star clusters and disperse, all within roughly two crossing times (10 Myr), supporting recent claims that star formation is a rapid process. Simple assumptions about the nature of the star formation occurring in the clusters allows us to place an estimate for the star formation efficiency at about 5–10 per cent, consistent with observations. We also propose that unbound clouds can act as a mechanism for forming OB associations. The clusters that form in the cloud behave as OB subgroups. These clusters are naturally expanding from one another due to the unbound nature of the flows that create them. The properties of the cloud we present here are consistent with those of classic OB associations.