Astronomy › Section O · Star birth and exoplanets › Topic O.1
Star formation
Every star, the Sun included, began as a cold, dark knot inside a cloud of gas and dust. Gravity squeezed it, spin flattened its surroundings into a disc, and jets cleared the way until a new star could shine.
In this topic
- Stars are still being born
- Giant molecular clouds
- Gravity against pressure
- What sets off a collapse
- A nursery we can study: Orion
- Spin makes a disc
- Worked example: how fast does a core spin up?
- Worked example: why protostars glow in the infrared
- Winds, jets and Herbig-Haro objects
- Common mistakes to avoid
- Key takeaways
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