AST 309 Lecture Notes - Lecture 9: None Of The Above, Initial Mass Function, Edwin Ernest Salpeter
Document Summary
Fragments, some with newly forming protostars, in the tips of them in m16, How fast an object is rotating, mass of the object, how that mass is distributed (size) A compact ice skater has to spin more rapidly to have the same amount of angular momentum as she does when she is more extended (her mass is the same) A cloud"s angular momentum keeps it from being able to directly collapse into a ball. Interstellar clouds are very big in size, and they are constantly stirred around as they orbit the galaxy, therefore they have some intrinsic rotation. The cloud of gas must also speed up (rotate faster and faster) as it collapses and shrinks in size. A rate of one rotation in only . 6 seconds, this is over 3 million times faster than the sun actually rotates. The cloud collapses into a disk, rather than just directly into a star.
