TY - JOUR
T1 - The first jets in the universe
T2 - Protostellar jets from the first stars
AU - Machida, Masahiro N.
AU - Omukai, Kazuyuki
AU - Matsumoto, Tomoaki
AU - Inutsuka, Shu Ichiro
N1 - Funding Information:
We thank T. Kato, K. Saigo, and H. Susa for valuable discussion, and T. Hanawa for contributing to the numerical code. Numerical calculations were carried out with a Fujitsu VPP5000 at ADAC of NAO Japan. This work is supported by Grant-in-Aid for the 21st Century COE “Center for Diversity and Universality in Physics” from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology (MEXT) of Japan, and partially supported by Grants-in-Aid from MEXT (15740118, 16077202, 16740115).
PY - 2006/8/10
Y1 - 2006/8/10
N2 - The protostellar jets driven by the formation of the first stars are studied by using three-dimensional MHD nested grid simulations. Starting from a slowly rotating spherical cloud of 5.1 × 104 M⊙ permeated by a uniform magnetic field, we follow the evolution from the central number density nc = 103 cm-3 to nc ≃ 1023 cm-3. Protostars of ≃ 10-3 M⊙ are formed at nc ≃ 1022 cm-3, and the magnetic flux density is amplified by 10 orders of magnitude from the initial value. Consequently, the formed protostar has a magnetic field of ∼ 10 6 G, which is much larger than the flux density of the present-day counterparts, reflecting the fact that the dissipation of a magnetic field is ineffective in primordial gas clouds. If the initial magnetic field B > 10-9 (nc/103 cm-3)2/3 G, a protostellar jet is launched whose velocity reaches ∼ 70 km s -1. As a result, a fraction (3%-10%) of the accreting matter is blown off from the central region. If this jet continues to sweep out the surrounding gas that otherwise accretes onto the central star or circumstellar disk, the final mass of the first star can be substantially reduced. In addition, dense postshock regions behind the bow shocks are expected to promote chemical reactions, and this provides possible environments for subsequent low-mass star formation in the early universe.
AB - The protostellar jets driven by the formation of the first stars are studied by using three-dimensional MHD nested grid simulations. Starting from a slowly rotating spherical cloud of 5.1 × 104 M⊙ permeated by a uniform magnetic field, we follow the evolution from the central number density nc = 103 cm-3 to nc ≃ 1023 cm-3. Protostars of ≃ 10-3 M⊙ are formed at nc ≃ 1022 cm-3, and the magnetic flux density is amplified by 10 orders of magnitude from the initial value. Consequently, the formed protostar has a magnetic field of ∼ 10 6 G, which is much larger than the flux density of the present-day counterparts, reflecting the fact that the dissipation of a magnetic field is ineffective in primordial gas clouds. If the initial magnetic field B > 10-9 (nc/103 cm-3)2/3 G, a protostellar jet is launched whose velocity reaches ∼ 70 km s -1. As a result, a fraction (3%-10%) of the accreting matter is blown off from the central region. If this jet continues to sweep out the surrounding gas that otherwise accretes onto the central star or circumstellar disk, the final mass of the first star can be substantially reduced. In addition, dense postshock regions behind the bow shocks are expected to promote chemical reactions, and this provides possible environments for subsequent low-mass star formation in the early universe.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=33748457364&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=33748457364&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1086/507326
DO - 10.1086/507326
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:33748457364
SN - 0004-637X
VL - 647
SP - L1-L4
JO - Astrophysical Journal
JF - Astrophysical Journal
IS - 1 II
ER -