Herbig-Haro Flows and the Birth of Low Mass Stars


Book Description

Herbig-Haro objects were discovered 50 years ago, and during this half century they have developed from being mysterious small nebulae to be coming an important phenomenon in star formation. Indeed, HH flows are now recognized not only as fascinating astrophysical laboratories involving shock physics and chemistry, hydrodynamics and radiation processes, but it has gradually been realized that HH flows hold essential clues to the birth and early evolution of low mass stars. IAU Symposium No. 182 on Herbig-Haro Flows and the Birth of Low Mass Stars were held from January 20 to 24, 1997 in Chamonix in the french alps. A total of 178 researchers from 26 countries met to discuss our present level of understanding of Herbig-Haro flows and their relation to disk accretion events and T Tauri winds and other outflow phenomena like molecular outflows, embedded molecular hydrogen flows and radio jets. The present book contains the manuscripts from the oral contributions of the symposium. The poster papers were printed in a separate volume Low Mass Star Formation - from Infall to Outflow, edited by Fabien Malbet and Alain Castets, which was distributed at the beginning of the meeting. Together these two books document the vigorous state and the scientific appeal which research into Herbig-Haro flows and related issues in star formation enjoys today, observationally as well as theoretically.




Cyclical Variability in Stellar Winds


Book Description

It is well known that stellar winds are variable, and the fluctuations are often cyclical in nature. This property seems to be shared by the winds of cool and hot stars, even though their outflows are driven by fundamentally different physical mechanisms. Since very similar models have been proposed to explain the cyclical wind variations observed in a wide variety of stars, the time was ripe for astrophysicists from many different sub-disciplines to present the state of the art in a concise form. The proceedings will provide a useful, up-to-date overview of the observations, interpretation, and modelling of the time-dependent mass outflows from all sorts of stars.




Planets Outside the Solar System: Theory and Observations


Book Description

The question of the existence of other worlds and other living beings has been present in the human quest for knowledge since as far as Epicurus. For centuries this question belonged to the fields of philosophy and theology. The theoretical problem of the formation of the Solar System, and hence of other planetary systems, was tackled only during the 18th century, while the first observational attempts for a detection started less than one hundred years ago. Direct observation of an extra-solar planetary system is an extraordinarily difficult problem: extra-solar planets are at huge distances, are incredibly faint and are overwhelmed by the bright light of their own stars. With virtually no observational insight to test their models, theoreticians have remained for decades in a difficult position to make substantial progress. Yet, the field of stellar formation has provided since the 1980s both the the oretical and observational evidences for the formation of discs at the stage of star birth and for debris materials orbiting the very young stellar systems. It was tempting to consider that these left-overs might indeed later agglomerate into planetary systems more or less similar to ours. Then came observational evidences for planets outside the Solar System.




Laser Guide Star Adaptive Optics for Astronomy


Book Description

Adaptive optics allows the theoretical limit of angular resolution to be achieved from a large telescope, despite the presence of turbulence. Thus an eight meter class telescope, such as one of the four in the Very Large Telescope operated by ESO in Chile, will in future be routinely capable of an angular resolution of almost 0.01 arcsec, compared tot he present resolution of about 0.5 arcsec for conventional imaging in good condition. All the world's major telescopes either have adaptive optics or are in the process of building AO systems. It turns out that a reasonable fraction of the sky can be observed using adaptive optics, with moderately good imaging quality, provided imaging in done in the near IR. To move out of the near IR, with its relatively poor angular resolution, astronomers need a laser guide star. There is a layer of Na atoms at approximately 90 km altitude that can be excited by a laser to produce such a source, or Rayleigh scattering can be employed lower in the atmosphere. But the production and use of laser guide stars is not trivial, and the key issues determining their successful implementation are discussed here, including the physics of the Na atom, the cone effect, tilt determination, sky coverage, and numerous potential astronomical applications.




The Origin of Stars and Planetary Systems


Book Description

A few years after the publication of The Physics of Star Formation and Early Stellar Evolution, we received a request from the publisher for an up dated second edition of this popular reference book. As originally intended, the volume had proved to be a useful "text" book for graduate astronomy courses and seminars which dealt with topics related to stellar origins. The book was based on a series of lectures delivered by a distinguished group of leading researchers at a NATO Advanced Study Institute (ASI) held in May 1990 on the island of Crete, Greece. The primary goal of the ASI was in fact to produce a book which "would simultaneously provide a broad and systematic overview of, as well as a rigorous introduction to, the fun damental physics and astronomy at the heart of modern research in star formation and early stellar evolution. " However, by 1995 concern had arisen among those who used the text as a reference for graduate seminars and courses that the book would need to be updated to stay abreast of the discoveries and progress in this rapidly evolving field. After some discussion we concluded that a new edition of the book was warranted and that the goal of producing a new edition would be best accomplished by organizing a second ASI in Crete to review the progress in star formation research.




Jets from Young Stars


Book Description

This volume presents the edited lecture notes of the First JETSET School on Jets from Young Stars: Models and Constraints, held by the Marie Curie Research and Training Network on JET Simulations, Experiments and Theory. The first half of the book is devoted to general observational constraints. The second section is devoted to theoretical knowledge of magneto-hydrodynamic processes pertinent to the jet launching mechanism in young stars.




Astrophysical Jets


Book Description

First Published in 2004. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.




Jets in Young Stellar Objects


Book Description

A JENAM 2002 Workshop, Porto, Portugal, 3-5 September 2002




Solar and Extra-Solar Planetary Systems


Book Description

Both the high level of activity in worldwide space exploration programmes and the discovery of extra-solar planets have spurred renewed interest in the physics and evolution dynamics of solar systems. The present book has grown out of a set of lectures by leading experts in the field within the framework of the well-known EADN summer schools. It addresses primarily graduate students and young researchers but will be equally useful for scientists in search of a comprehensive tutorial account that goes beyond the material found in standard textbooks.




Molecular Hydrogen in Space


Book Description

The first multi-disciplinary review of our new understanding of molecular hydrogen in space, and its role in the early Universe.