Image of Alice in Wonderland at the Mad Hatter's tea party You are cordially invited to afternoon tea and biscuits wine and chocolate

Astronomy Tea Talks at Caltech

Mondays, Hameetman auditorium (Cahill)
Tea:  4.00pm
Talk: 4.15pm

Organized by:

2011 - 2012 season:
2 April 2012 Jon Swift (Caltech)

'The Progeny of the Interstellar Medium'

The formation of stars and planets from the dense interstellar medium is a ubiquitous process in the Galaxy. On the largest scales the interstellar medium (ISM) follows the spiral structure of the Galaxy, while smaller scales exhibit a more stochastic arrangement due to its turbulent nature. These pervasive chaotic motions within the ISM consistently produce a predictable mass distribution of stars, and there is evidence that the structure of the molecular gas itself determines the shape of this fundamental distribution. Planet formation is also a robust process that occurs as a byproduct of star formation, and therefore the detailed mechanisms of forming stars have a direct bearing on the populations of planets that we are just becoming aware of today. In this talk I will give an overview of several different lines of research I've participated in to gain a better understanding of this process that is essential to producing the cosmos we are familiar with.
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Last modified on 01st Apr 2012 by Marco Viero.  

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