Abstract
Our galaxy is composed of billions of stars concentrated in the galactic plane, surrounded by interstellar gas, which is mainly composed of hydrogen. About half of the hydrogen is distributed uniformly in the galaxy; the other half is concentrated in interstellar clouds. We find atomic hydrogen in diffuse clouds (with a particle number density n = 10 cm−3); we find molecular hydrogen (H2) in dark clouds (n = 103 cm−3). Finally we have interstellar molecular clouds (n = 106 cm−3) which also contain more complex molecules.
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Literature
Taylor, R.J., 1972, The stars: Their Structure and Evolution, Springer Verlag, New York
Iben,I. Jr, 1972, Normal Stellar Evolution, in Stellar Evolution, H.Y. Chiu and A. Murriel, eds. MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass.
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© 1992 Springer Science+Business Media New York
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De Loore, C.W.H., Doom, C. (1992). The Formation of Stars. In: Structure and Evolution of Single and Binary Stars. Astrophysics and Space Science Library, vol 179. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-2502-4_9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-2502-4_9
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-0-7923-1844-6
Online ISBN: 978-94-011-2502-4
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive