Young stars and outflows : case studies of three different regions

Abstract: Mass is clearly the most important parameter of a star as it determines the phases it will go through, its physical parameters, the elements produced and its life span. Two important processes that occur simultaneously in young stars are directly related to the final mass a star ends up with; the accretion of material onto the star from a circumstellar disk and the bipolar outflow of material from the star. These processes are related since the infalling material drives the outflow. The life span of circumstellar disks is also important for the possibility of life, as this limits the time available for planet formation. This may depend on the stellar mass and its environment.Three detailed observational case-studies are presented, a globule (B335) that is forming only one or two stars, a medium-sized star formation region (L1551) and a large cluster of young stars (YSOs) in a part of our nearest giant molecular cloud (L1641N).The first part of this thesis concerns finding YSOs by looking for mid-IR excess, indicative of circumstellar disks, using the ISO and Spitzer satellites in combination with ground-based observations. Other signs of youth are also used; H-alpha in emission (accretion), Li 6707 in absorption (Li is destroyed with age) and cloud membership based on extinction. The detection of 15 new YSO candidates in L1551 (Paper I) and 89 YSOs in L1641N (Paper II) is presented. In L1641N, distributions are presented of stellar age and mass. An empirical extinction law is found and the star formation history is presented. There seems to be an accelerated star formation with time. This can however also be explained, at least partly, by migration of older stars from the cluster - a migration that may very well be mass dependent.The second part concerns bipolar outflows. The discovery of six Herbig-Haro objects and at least 15 H2 objects in B335 is presented (Paper III) as well as proper motions for previously known objects. A planar shock model is used to calculate shock velocities. In L1641N (Paper IV) we discover a new outflow source and connect this to a number of H2 objects that are found to be part of this flow from proper motion measurements.