Observational studies of the massive star formation triggered by cloud-cloud collision

2017 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 15K17607
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (B)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Astronomy
• Research Institution: National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (2016-2017); Nagoya University (2015)
• Principal Investigator: TORII Kazufumi 国立天文台, 野辺山宇宙電波観測所, 特任助教 (20444383)
• Project Period (FY): 2015-04-01 – 2018-03-31
• Keywords: 星形成 / 電波天文 / 分子雲 / 分子雲衝突 / 大質量星

Outline of Final Research Achievements

In this study, we aimed at understanding the mechanism of high-mass stars by observing natal molecular clouds in the various high-mass star forming regions. We especially focused on the high-mass star formation triggered by cloud-cloud collision (CCC).
First, we established observationally diagnostics of cloud-cloud collision by comparing between numerical calculations and observations of CCC, resulted in finding the importance of "complementary distribution" and "intermediate velocity feature" between two molecular clouds with different radial velocities. Second, we applied these diagnostics to the high-mass star forming regions in the galactic plane and Large Magellanic cloud. As a result, we discovered evidence of CCCs in more than 40 high-mass star forming regions. These results strongly indicate that CCC is one of the major modes of the high-mass star formation in the Galaxy.

Free Research Field

星間物理学