Primordial mass segregation in simulations of star formation?

Abstract

We take the end result of smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) simulations of star formation which include feedback from photoionisation and stellar winds and evolve them for a further 10Myr using $N$-body simulations. We compare the evolution of each simulation to a control run without feedback, and to a run with photoionisation feedback only. In common with previous work, we find that the presence of feedback prevents the runaway growth of massive stars, and the resulting star-forming regions are less dense, and preserve their initial substructure for longer. The addition of stellar winds to the feedback produces only marginal differences compared to the simulations with just photoionisation feedback. We search for mass segregation at different stages in the simulations; before feedback is switched on in the SPH runs, at the end of the SPH runs (before $N$-body integration) and during the $N$-body evolution. Whether a simulation is primordially mass segregated (i.e. before dynamical evolution) depends extensively on how mass segregation is defined, and different methods for measuring mass segregation give apparently contradictory results. Primordial mass segregation is also less common in the simulations when star formation occurs under the influence of feedback. Further dynamical mass segregation can also take place during the subsequent (gas-free) dynamical evolution. Taken together, our results suggest that extreme caution should be exercised when interpreting the spatial distribution of massive stars relative to low-mass stars in simulations.

14 pages, 11 figures, accepted for publication in MNRAS

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Cited by in corpus (7)

• The Physics of Star Cluster Formation and Evolution
• Disruption of giant molecular clouds and formation of bound star clusters under the influence of momentum stellar feedback
• Comparisons between different techniques for measuring mass segregation
• How fast is mass-segregation happening in hierarchical formed embedded star clusters?
• ${\mathcal{Q}}^{+}$: Characterising the structure of young star clusters
• Hierarchical formation of Westerlund 1: a collapsing cluster with no primordial mass segregation?
• No preferential spatial distribution for massive stars expected from their formation