Journal
MONTHLY NOTICES OF THE ROYAL ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY
Volume 441, Issue 3, Pages 2181-2187Publisher
OXFORD UNIV PRESS
DOI: 10.1093/mnras/stu714
Keywords
astrochemistry; methods: numerical; stars: Population III; ISM: molecules; cosmology: theory
Categories
Funding
- DFG priority programme 'The Physics of the Interstellar Medium' [SCHL 1964/1-1]
- SFB 963/1 on 'Astrophysical Flow Instabilities and Turbulence' [A12]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
While Population III (Pop III) stars are typically thought to be massive, pathways towards lower mass Pop III stars may exist when the cooling of the gas is particularly enhanced. A possible route is enhanced HD cooling during the merging of dark-matter haloes. The mergers can lead to a high ionization degree catalysing the formation of HD molecules and may cool the gas down to the cosmic microwave background temperature. In this paper, we investigate the merging of mini-haloes with masses of a few 10(5) M-aS (TM) and explore the feasibility of this scenario. We have performed three-dimensional cosmological hydrodynamics calculations with the enzo code, solving the thermal and chemical evolution of the gas by employing the astrochemistry package krome. Our results show that the HD abundance is increased by two orders of magnitude compared to the no-merging case and the halo cools down to similar to 60 K triggering fragmentation. Based on Jeans estimates, the expected stellar masses are about 10 M-aS (TM). Our findings show that the merging scenario is a potential pathway for the formation of low-mass stars.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available