We study how the gas reservoir of
galaxies—including the Milky Way—gives rise to new stars.
Star formation process is dependent on a large variety of physical
forces and processes, such as gravity, turbulence, thermodynamics, magnetic
fields, and chemistry. These processes act over a wide range of scales, from
scales of the entire galaxy down to individual stars. Therefore, study of star
formation is truly a multi-physics, multi-scale field.The key questions we study are such as: How do
different physical processes regulate star formation and determine when and
where new stars form? What sets the masses of individual stars? How does the
gas collapse accrete onto young stars? How do star clusters form? How is
gas—the raw material of new stars—distributed in the Milky Way? How does star
formation affect the evolution of galaxies?
Faculty members involved:
Per Bjerkeli, Jouni Kainulainen, Kirsten Kraiberg Knudsen, Allessandro Romeo, Jonathan Tan, Magnus Thomasson, Wouter Vlemmings, John Black.
Highlighted programs/projects:
CICO (Tan); MSTAR (ERC Advanced Grant; PI Tan),
PROMISE Origins of the Molecular Cloud Structure (ERC Starting Grant, PI
Kainulainen),
Young Outflows and Disks with ALMA (YODA) (Co-PI Bjerkeli),
The Origin and Fate of Dust in the Universe (KAW Project Grant, PI Knudsen).
Top image: Molecular clouds mapped in the PROMISE survey / J. Kainulainen.