The Formation of Low Mass Stars

Abstract

The- question of the origin of stars is one of the most fundamental of astronomy. Yet, despite thousands of years of stellar observation, and early speculations by Newton and Laplace, it has only been in the latter part of the present century that the investigation of star formation has become an active discipline of astrophysical research. That the origin of stars has remained so mysterious for so long is largely due to the fact that the process of star formation has never been directly observed either with the naked eye or the with most powerful telescopes. Moreover, prior to the twentieth century neither the energy source nor the bulk composition of stars were known. Indeed, without knowledge of the physical nature of stars it was very difficult to develop an understanding of their origin. At the end of the nineteenth century, the nature of the mystery surrounding stellar origins was nicely summed up by the fictional character Huck Finn (in the book The Adventures of Huck Finn by Mark Twain) when he observed the stars in the night sky and wondered “…did they just happen or was they made?”