SCYON Abstract

Received on August 30 2010

Escaping stars from young low-N clusters

AuthorsC. Weidner (1,2), I.A. Bonnell (1), and N. Moeckel (2)
Affiliation(1) Scottish Universities Physics Alliance (SUPA), School of Physics and Astronomy, University of St. Andrews, North Haugh, St. Andrews, Fife KY16 9SS, UK
(2) Institute of Astronomy, Madingley Road, Cambridge CB3 0HA, UK
Aceppted byMonthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Contactcw60@st-andrews.ac.uk
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Abstract

With the use of N-body calculations the amount and properties of escaping stars from low-N (N = 100 and 1000) young embedded star clusters prior to gas expulsion are studied over the first 5 Myr of their existence. Besides the number of stars also different initial radii and binary populations are examined as well as virialised and collapsing clusters. It is found that these clusters can loose substantial amounts (up to 20%) of stars within 5 Myr with considerable velocities up to more than 100 km/s. Even with their mean velocities between 2 and 8 km/s these stars will still be travelling between 2 and 30 pc during the 5 Myr. Therefore can large amounts of distributed stars in star-forming regions not necessarily be counted as evidence for the isolated formation of stars.