11: Star Formation
- Page ID
- 115285
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Where do stars come from? We know that they are made of mostly hydrogen, and there is plenty of gas and dust in space. What brings hydrogen together? If it is gravity, there needs to be a large amount of material because hydrogen is the lightest element and able to easily escape gravity's pull. This chapter will explore the starting conditions and events that trigger star formation.
- Identify the processes by which parts of a molecular cloud collapse to produce stars
- Describe how advancing waves of star formation cause a molecular cloud to change
- Describe a Herbig-Haro object, identifying the jets, disk, and protostar
- Determine the age of a protostar using an H–R diagram and the protostar’s luminosity and temperature
- Explain how astronomers interpreted observations of disks around young stars to create a model of planet formation
Thumbnail: The protostar L1527 inside its formative nebula, as captured by the James Webb Space Telescope (CC BY 4.0; NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI, J. DePasquale (STScI) via Wikimedia Commons)