Star-Formation and Astrochemistry
How stars and planetary systems form is one of the most active research topics in modern astrophysics. Much progress has been made in the last decade thanks to the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) telescope. In particular, planet formation is now suspected to start very early, when the star is still in its infancy. One way to tackle the origin of stars and planets is to use millimeter and submillimeter line and continuum observations to characterize the physical properties and chemical composition of the material surrounding the forming star—at disk, envelope and outflow scales. These are the main goals of the ALMA Large Project FAUST, which enables new insights into the formation of stars and planets by focusing on a carefully defined sample of protostellar systems with different physical and chemical characteristics.
Most stars are not born single; rather they form as part of small multiple systems (mostly binaries, but also triples and quadruples). The early evolution of such systems and the possibility of associated planetary systems is strongly affected by multiplicity, so it is important to characterize in detail the architecture of young mutiple systems. This can be done with Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI) as described in the VLBI Astrometry section of this Web page. For long period systems, it can also be done with conventional interferometers such as ALMA or the Very Large Array (VLA). A recent example can be found in our study of the L1551 IRS5 system.
