MacDonald Observatory | University of Texas | 2018 Sep 12
New research by Stella Offner ... finds that magnetic waves are an important factor driving the process of star formation within the enormous clouds that birth stars. Her research sheds light on the processes that are responsible for setting the properties of stars, which in turn affects the formation of planets orbiting them, and, ultimately, life on those planets. ...
Offner used a supercomputer to make models of the multitude of processes happening inside a cloud where stars are forming, in an effort to sort out which processes lead to which effects. ...
Some astronomers attribute the observed motions to gravitational collapse, while others attribute it to turbulence and stellar feedback. Offner wanted to test these theories and study how stars shape their birth environment, but it’s virtually impossible to use telescope observations of these clouds to separate the influence of the various processes ...
Turbulent Action at a Distance due to Stellar Feedback in Magnetized Clouds ~ Stella S. R. Offner, Yue Liu
- Nature Astronomy (online 10 Sep 2018) DOI: 10.1038/s41550-018-0566-1
arXiv.org > astro-ph > arXiv:1809.03513 > 10 Sep 2018