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On the fragmentation of cosmic gas clouds. I - The formation of galaxies and the first generation of stars
Abstract
The formation of galaxies is studied in the context of the fragmentation of massive diffuse ionized gas clouds. A semiquantitative discussion of the role of cooling indicates that there is a characteristic mass of a galaxy (of the order of 500 billion solar masses) which can fragment out of an ionized medium of density not exceeding 10 to the -25th power g/cu cm, whereas more massive galaxies attain a characteristic radius of the order of 60 kpc. The relationship between binding energy and mass is investigated for spheroidal galaxies. The role of H2 and Ly-alpha cooling in the fragmentation of primordial gas clouds is evaluated, and relatively qualitative arguments indicate that the first stars have masses of at least 0.3 solar mass with a characteristic mass of approximately 20 solar masses. When the average heavy-element abundance by mass exceeds about 0.00001, heavy-element cooling prevails over Ly-alpha cooling, and subsequent fragmentation forms second-generation stars of low characteristic mass.
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“Coincidentally, our Galaxy is at the critical mass where one expects both the SNe and black hole feedback to be active.”
From The Fermi/eROSITA bubbles: a look into the nuclear outflow from the Milky Way (2024) · cites this paper as Silk 1977
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“Galactic outflows are ubiquitous in galaxies containing active star formation or supermassive black hole activity.”
From The Fermi/eROSITA bubbles: a look into the nuclear outflow from the Milky Way (2024) · cites this paper as Silk 1977
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Das, A., Pandey, B., & Sarkar, S. (2022) · Research in Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1088/1674-4527/acab44 · Cited by 14
POSSIBLE EVIDENCE FOR METAL ACCRETION ONTO THE SURFACES OF METAL-POOR MAIN-SEQUENCE STARS
Hattori, K., Yoshii, Y., Beers, T. C., Carollo, D., & Lee, Y. S. (2014) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.1088/0004-637x/784/2/153 · Cited by 14
“…star, Z < 7.4 × 10−7, is the lowest known to date, and heavy-element cooling in metal-poor gas with Z < Zcrit = 10−5–10−6 is superseded by purely atomic or molecular hydrogen or zero-metal cooling (Silk 1977; Yoshii & Sabano 1980; Bromm et al. 2001; Smith et al. 2009; SafranekShrader et al. 2010).”
BackgroundInfluentialUltraviolet-background-induced bifurcation of galactic morphology
Susa, H., & Umemura, M. (2000) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1046/j.1365-8711.2000.03732.x · Cited by 14
“A substantial basis of the galaxy formation theory has been founded by several pioneering works in 1970s ((Rees & Ostriker 1977); (Silk 1977)).”
BackgroundTHE TEMPERATURE OF HOT GAS IN GALAXIES AND CLUSTERS: BARYONS DANCING TO THE TUNE OF DARK MATTER
Hansen, S. H., Macciò, A. V., Romano-Diaz, E., et al. (2011) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.1088/0004-637x/734/1/62 · Cited by 13
“The baryons can either cool fast to form stars or end up as a hot virialized gas (Rees & Ostriker 1977; Silk 1977; Birnboim & Dekel 2003; Kereš et al. 2005).”
BackgroundThe Supersonic Project: To Cool or Not to Cool Supersonically Induced Gas Objects (SIGOs)?
Chiou, Y. S., Naoz, S., Burkhart, B., et al. (2021) · DSpace@MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) · Cited by 13
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Sullivan, J. M., Hirano, S., & Bromm, V. (2018) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Letters · doi:10.1093/mnrasl/sly164 · Cited by 13
“An important concept in the theory of galaxy formation is the Rees-Ostriker-Silk (ROS) cooling criterion (Rees & Ostriker 1977; Silk 1977).”
BackgroundMethodChemistry of heavy elements in the Dark Ages
Vonlanthen, P., Rauscher, T., Winteler, C., et al. (2009) · Springer Link (Chiba Institute of Technology) · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/200811297/pdf · Cited by 13
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“The current paradigm of galaxy formation owes its root to a few seminal papers from the seventies (Rees & Ostriker 1977; Silk 1977; White & Rees 1978; Fall & Efstathiou 1980).”
BackgroundSDSS J102915.14+172927.9: Revisiting the chemical pattern
Caffau, E., Bonifacio, P., Monaco, L., Steffen, M., Sbordone, L., Spite, M., François, P., Gallagher, A. J., Ludwig, H. ‐., & Molaro, P. P. (2024) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202452079 · Cited by 14
CMB distortion from circumgalactic gas
Singh, P., Nath, B. B., Majumdar, S., et al. (2015) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stv155 · Cited by 12
“The standard scenario of galaxy formation predicts that baryonic gas falls into dark matter potentials and gets heated to the virial temperature (Silk 1977; White & Rees 1978; White & Frenk 1991).”
BackgroundSelf-citationA new gas cooling model for semi-analytic galaxy formation models
Hou, J., Lacey, C. G., & Frenk, C. S. (2017) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stx3218 · Cited by 12
“…gas cooling that are more or less based on the gas cooling picture set out in White & Frenk (1991) [also see Binney (1977); Rees & Ostriker (1977); Silk (1977) and White & Rees (1978)], in which the gas in a dark matter halo initially settles in a spherical pressure-supported hot gas halo, and…”
The MOSDEF-LRIS survey: detection of inflowing gas towards three star-forming galaxies at z ∼ 2
Weldon, A., Reddy, N. A., Topping, M. W., Shapley, A. E., Du, X., Price, S. H., Sanders, R. L., Coil, A. L., Mobasher, B., Kriek, M., et al. (2023) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stad1615 · Cited by 13
Gas Accretion and Angular Momentum
Stewart, K. R. (2017) · Astrophysics and space science library · doi:10.1007/978-3-319-52512-9_11 · Cited by 12
“…cooling out of this hot gaseous halo, sinking to the center of the halo and onto the central galaxy (e.g. Binney, 1977; Rees & Ostriker, 1977; Silk, 1977; Kyle R. Stewart Department of Mathematical Sciences, California Baptist University, 8432 Magnolia Ave., Riverside, CA 92504, USA,…”
BackgroundDinge, D. (1997) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.1086/303910 · Cited by 12
“…sort of substructure which goes on to collapse, collide, and/or fragment in order to produce the objects we observe today Murray & Lin(Fall 1985 ; Silk 1977 ; 1990, A complete treatment of these theories reveals several1993). types of phenomena all acting at once in a nonlinear manner and…”
BackgroundLarge numbers and ratios in astrophysics and cosmology
Rees, M. J. (1983) · Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London Series A Mathematical and Physical Sciences · doi:10.1098/rsta.1983.0093 · Cited by 12
From nuclei to atoms and molecules: the chemical history of the early Universe
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“…molecules in rotating and collapsing spheroidal gas clouds, and suggested an early period of formation of objects in the mass range of ordinary stars; which led to the model of Silk (1977) concerning the fragmentation of cosmic gas clouds consisting of gas of a predominantly primordial composition.”
BackgroundCGM2 + CASBaH: The Mass Dependence of H i Lyα–Galaxy Clustering and the Extent of the CGM
Wilde, M. C., Tchernyshyov, K., Werk, J. K., et al. (2023) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/acc85b · Cited by 11
“≈ 109.8M ), this pressure support comes from fact that the gas that has fallen into the gravitational potential well is virially shocked and cannot cool within a Hubble time (Binney 1977; Rees & Ostriker 1977; Silk 1977).”
Backgroundde Beer, S., Cantalupo, S., Travascio, A., et al. (2023) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stad2682 · Cited by 11
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“Hot halo gas: In the standard cold dark matter scenario of structure formation in the universe, baryonic gas falls into dark matter potentials and gets heated to the virial temperature (Silk 1977; White & Rees 1978; White & Frenk 1991).”
BackgroundThe Origin of Globular Clusters
Fall, S. M., & Rees, M. J. (1988) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-94-015-1104-9_45 · Cited by 11
“Our starting point is the widely held view that fragmentation and star formation should occur in a proto-galaxy when it can cool in a free-fall time (Binney 1977, Rees and Ostriker 1977, Silk 1977).”
BackgroundSilk, J. I., & Bouwens, R. (1987) · New Astronomy Reviews · doi:10.1016/s1387-6473(00)00164-0 · Cited by 11
Self-citationA pregalactic Population III: primordial helium and heavy elements and the microwave background
Tarbet, P. W., & Rowan-Robinson, M. (1982) · Nature · doi:10.1038/298711a0 · Cited by 11
Very massive stars: Evolution with mass loss
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Metal-poor Stars Observed with the Southern African Large Telescope II. An Extended Sample
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“…the formation of second-generation (Population II) stars with sufficiently low mass (and long lifetimes) that they should be presently observable (Sabano & Yoshii 1977; Silk 1977; Bromm & Loeb 2003; Frebel et al. 2007; Frebel & Bromm 2012; Susa et al. 2014; Chiaki et al. 2017; Dutta et al. 2020).”
BackgroundSpeller, R., & Taylor, J. E. (2014) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.1088/0004-637x/788/2/188 · Cited by 10
“This argument provided the original framework for understanding why individual galaxies have the range of masses and sizes they do, with fairly well defined upper and lower limits (Silk 1977; Rees & Ostriker 1977; White & Rees 1978).”
BackgroundDrivers of disc tilting I: correlations and possible drivers for Milky Way analogues
Earp, S. W. F., Debattista, V. P., Macciò, A. V., Wang, L., Buck, T., & Khachaturyants, T. (2019) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stz2109 · Cited by 12
“…matter’s potential well it is shock heated to the halo virial temperature Tvir = 106(νcirc/167km s−1)2K, forming a hot gas corona (Spitzer 1956; Rees & Ostriker 1977; Silk 1977; White & Rees 1978; Savage & de Boer 1979; White & Frenk 1991; Dahlem 1997; Wang et al. 2001; Fukugita & Peebles 2006).”
BackgroundBond, J. R., Szalay, A. S., & Wilson, J. R. (1984) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-94-009-7245-2_5 · Cited by 10
Bagla, J. S., & Prasad, J. (2009) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1111/j.1365-2966.2008.14224.x · Cited by 10
“Galaxies are believed to form when gas in highly over-dense haloes cools and collapses to form stars in large numbers (Hoyle 1953; Rees & Ostriker 1977; Silk 1977; Binney 1977).”
BackgroundStar Formation and Galactic Evolution: From Protogalaxies to Starbursts
Silk, J. I. (1987) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-94-009-4782-5_206 · Cited by 10
Self-citationTsuribe, T., & Umemura, M. (1997) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.1086/304489 · Cited by 10
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Nusser, A., Yepes, G., & Branchini, E. (2020) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/abc42f · Cited by 9
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Waterval, S., Cannarozzo, C., & Macciò, A. V. (2025) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/staf198 · Cited by 9
Near Field Cosmology: The Origin of the Galaxy and the Local Group
Bland‐Hawthorn, J., & Freeman, K. C. (2014) · Saas-Fee Advanced Course · doi:10.1007/978-3-642-41720-7_1 · Cited by 9
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Ostriker, J. P., & Naab, T. (2012) · Physics Today · doi:10.1063/pt.3.1679 · Cited by 9
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Manrique, A., Salvador-Solé, E., Juan, E., et al. (2015) · The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series · doi:10.1088/0067-0049/216/1/13 · Cited by 9
“This “hierarchical scenario” (Rees & Ostriker 1977; Silk 1977;White & Rees 1978; Blumenthal et al. 1984; White & Frenk 1991) explains indeed the main observed galaxy properties.”
BackgroundChallenges in Cosmology from the Big Bang to Dark Energy, Dark Matter and Galaxy Formation
Silk, J. I. (2017) · Symposium on Nuclei in the Cosmos (NIC) · doi:10.7566/jpscp.14.010101 · Cited by 17
Self-citationDo Minor Interactions Trigger Star Formation in Galaxy Pairs?
Das, A., Pandey, B., & Sarkar, S. (2023) · Research in Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1088/1674-4527/aceccb · Cited by 8
Bennett, J. S., Smith, M. C., Fielding, D. B., Bryan, G. L., Kim, C., Springel, V., Hernquist, L., Somerville, R. S., & Sommovigo, L. (2025) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/staf1440 · Cited by 9
Galaxy Interactions in Filaments and Sheets: Insights from EAGLE Simulations
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Transonic solutions of isothermal galactic winds in a cold dark matter halo
Tsuchiya, M., Mori, M., & Nitta, S. (2013) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stt638 · Cited by 8
“In the standard CDM picture of galaxy formation, gas falling into CDM halos is shock-heated approximately to the halo virial temperature, thus the CDM halo maintains quasihydrostatic equilibrium (Rees & Ostriker 1977; Binney 1977; Silk 1977; White & Rees 1978).”
BackgroundOn the effects of rotation in primordial star-forming clouds
Dutta, J. (2015) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/201526747 · Cited by 8
“…has persuaded a number of groups to work persistently on the dynamics of collapsing gas clouds (Saslaw & Zipoy, 1967; Peebles & Dicke, 1968; Silk, 1977; Couchman & Rees, 1986; Haiman et al., 1996; Tegmark et al., 1997), leading to the formation of the very first stars in the Universe, the…”
BackgroundSato, T., Sawicki, M., & Arcila-Osejo, L. (2014) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stu1356 · Cited by 8
“While the importance of baryonic physics has been realized early in the canonical models of galaxy formation (e.g. Rees & Ostriker 1977; Silk 1977), the significance of supernovae/active galactic nuclei feedback in the self-regulation of SF activities has been suggested relatively recently (e.g.…”
BackgroundCosmic Reionization and the First Nonlinear Structures in the Universe
Haiman, Z. (2015) · Astrophysics and space science library · doi:10.1007/978-3-319-21957-8_1 · Cited by 8
Liu, B., Schauer, A. T. P., & Bromm, V. (2019) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stz1583 · Cited by 8
“MNRAS 000, 1–10 (2019) and conclude that the halo can undergo star formation when the Rees-Ostriker-Silk (ROS) cooling criterion tcool ≤ tff (Rees & Ostriker 1977; Silk 1977) is met (see also Sullivan et al. 2018).”
BackgroundChemistry in the Early Universe
Shapiro, P. R. (1992) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-94-011-2761-5_18 · Cited by 8
The Boundary between Explosion and Collapse in Very Massive Objects
Bond, J. R., Arnett, W. D., & Carr, B. J. (1982) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-94-009-7876-8_17 · Cited by 7
On the effects of rotation in primordial star-forming clouds
Dutta, J. (2015) · Springer Link (Chiba Institute of Technology) · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/201526747/pdf · Cited by 7
Monolithic View of Galaxy Formation and Evolution
Chiosi, C., Merlin, E., Piovan, L., & Tantalo, R. (2014) · Galaxies · doi:10.3390/galaxies2030300 · Cited by 7
Did Elliptical Galaxies Form by Mergers or by Dissipative Collapse?
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Advanced evolutionary phase of a first-generation star
Eryurt-Ezer, D. (1981) · Astrophysics and Space Science · doi:10.1007/bf00649426 · Cited by 7
Impact of Primordial Black Holes on the Formation of the First Stars and Galaxies
Liu, B., & Bromm, V. (2025) · Springer Series in Astrophysics and Cosmology · doi:10.1007/978-981-97-8887-3_11 · Cited by 6
Feedback from active galactic nuclei in galaxy groups
Eckert, D. (2023) · Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) · doi:10.5281/zenodo.7520601 · Cited by 6
Buie, E., Scannapieco, E., & Voit, G. M. (2022) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ac4bc2 · Cited by 6
“Once triggered, such feedback may prevent further condensation from the ambient halo (e.g. Silk 1977; Gaspari et al. 2012; McCourt et al. 2012; Voit et al. 2015; Voit et al. 2017).”
BackgroundGalaxy Formation from a Timescale Perspective
Laursen, P. (2023) · Mathematics online first collections · doi:10.1007/16618_2023_71 · Cited by 6
Formation of a proto-quasar from accretion flows in a halo
Mangalam, A. (2001) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361:20011405 · Cited by 6
“White & Rees 1979, Rees & Ostriker 1977, Silk 1977), we state the condition that a luminous core can form in a halo tc td (8) where tc is the cooling time and td is the dynamical time.”
BackgroundGalaxy Formation: Confrontation with Observations
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“…that the character is t ic energy d iss ipa t ion t ime- sca l e , de t e rmined b y a t o m i c c o o l i n g p rocesses , b e shor ter than the character is t ic d y n a m - ical t i m e - s c a l e , typ ica l ly a cross ing t ime (or a free-fall t ime) (Silk 1977a; Rees and Ostr iker 1977 ) .”
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Understanding Galaxy Formation and Evolution
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Pregalactic black holes: A new constraint
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Self-citationEffects of a Burst of Formation of First‐Generation Stars on the Evolution of Galaxies
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“…of the firstgeneration stars are from several solar masses to 10 M , depending on the assumedmass-luminosity relation for protostars derived by Silk (1977c); assuming that the opacity source within the protostar is due to grains, he obtained the protostar luminosity LðmÞ ¼ 102:47ðm=M Þ L ;…”
BackgroundHomogeneous Cosmological Models
Blanchard, A. (2000) · Astrophysics and space science library · doi:10.1007/978-94-011-4175-8_1 · Cited by 6
Orientation of Galaxies in Clusters
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The chemical composition of matter in the early universe
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EFFECTS OF A BURST OF FORMATION OF FIRST-GENERATION STARS ON THE EVOLUTION OF GALAXIESPreprint
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“…the halo gas is not hot enough to support the metals against gravitational free-fall, the timescale for r -process metals to be transported to the center of the galaxy will be roughly t ff (Rees & Ostriker 1977; Silk 1977; White & Rees 1978; Stern et al. 2019, 2020; Faucher-Gigu`ere & Oh 2023).”
Probing long-range forces between neutrinos with cosmic structures
Kaplan, D. E., Luo, X., & Rajendran, S. (2025) · Physical review. D/Physical review. D. · doi:10.1103/physrevd.111.055019 · Cited by 5
CLUSTERING PROPERTIES AND HALO MASSES FOR CENTRAL GALAXIES IN THE LOCAL UNIVERSE
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Dissipative Processes, Galaxy Formation and "Early" Star Formation
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Metal enrichment and reionization constraints on early star formation
Bagla, J. S., Kulkarni, G., & Padmanabhan, Τ. (2009) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1111/j.1365-2966.2009.15012.x · Cited by 5
“Galaxies are believed to form when gas in highlyoverdense haloes cools and collapses to form stars in significantnumbers (Hoyle 1953; Rees & Ostriker 1977; Silk 1977; Binney 1977).”
BackgroundDid the Bulge Form All at Once?
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The Formation of Dark Matter in Cooling Flows
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“One possible component of dark matter is a population of baryonic objects Sato, & Takeda(Matsuda, 1969 ; Yoneyama 1972 ; Peebles 1974 ; Silk 1977 ; Fall 1979 ; Carr, Bond, & Arnet that collapsed early in the history of1984) the universe, in a process perhaps distinct from galaxy formation.”
BackgroundMain sequence for rotating stars of intermediate mass
Eryurt-Ezer, D., Kırbıyık, H., & �zkara, N. (1986) · Astrophysics and Space Science · doi:10.1007/bf00644173 · Cited by 5
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The abundance and origin of cool gas in galaxy clusters in the TNG-Cluster simulation
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Force-feeding supermassive black holes with dissipative dark matter
Buckley, M. R., & Fernandez, N. (2025) · Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics · doi:10.1088/1475-7516/2025/11/085 · Cited by 4
Can Cooling and Heating Functions Be Modeled with Homogeneous Radiation Fields?
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“On smaller scales, this same behavior is replicated in star formation (e.g., Binney 1977; Rees & Ostriker 1977; Silk 1977).”
BackgroundRobinson, D. W., Avestruz, C., & Gnedin, N. Y. (2023) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stad3880 · Cited by 6
Evolution of cold streams in hot gaseous haloes
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On the Origin of Quenched but Gas-rich Regions at Kiloparsec Scales in Nearby Galaxies
Tao, J., & Li, C. (2024) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ad7367 · Cited by 4
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“In 1977, three papers were written, and all proposed variants of the same explanatory mechanism—one by J. Binney (1977), one by J. Silk (1977), and one by M. Rees and myself 12 Ostriker A nn u.”
BackgroundRees, M. J. (2022) · Annual Review of Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1146/annurev-astro-111021-084639 · Cited by 4
CLUSTERING PROPERTIES AND HALO MASSES FOR CENTRAL GALAXIES IN THE LOCAL UNIVERSE
Wang, L., Li, C., & Jing, Y. P. (2016) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/0004-637x/819/1/58 · Cited by 4
“…the so-called “halo quenching” process is expected to be at work for central galaxies of massive halos reaching a critical halo mass of ∼1012M, where the infalling gas is shock-heated to the virial temperature and is no longer able to cool efficiently (e.g., Rees & Ostriker 1977; Silk 1977).”
BackgroundFormation of a Proto-Quasar from Accretion Flows in a Halo
Mangalam, A. V. (2001) · Springer Link (Chiba Institute of Technology) · doi:10.1051/0004-6361:20011405/pdf · Cited by 4
Silk, J. I. (1984) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-94-009-6487-7_24 · Cited by 4
Self-citationSources and distributions of dark matter
Sikivie, P. (1995) · Nuclear Physics B - Proceedings Supplements · doi:10.1016/0920-5632(95)00459-m · Cited by 4
Understanding Galaxy Formation and EvolutionPreprint
Ávila-Reese, V. (2006) · Cited by 4
Moderate Influence of Halo Spin on Stellar Mass Distributions in Dwarf and Massive Galaxies
Rong, Y., Hua, Z., & Hu, H. (2024) · Research in Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1088/1674-4527/ad9b78 · Cited by 3
History of globulettes in the Milky Way
Grenman, T., Elfgren, E., & Weber, H. W. (2018) · Astrophysics and Space Science · doi:10.1007/s10509-017-3233-6 · Cited by 3
“They may have formed in situ from a direct collapse of a molecular cloud by fragmentation, similar to star formation (e.g. Silk 1977; Bowler et al. 2011).”
BackgroundSAUNAS. I. Searching for Low Surface Brightness X-Ray Emission with Chandra/ACIS
Borlaff, A., Marcum, P., Alpaslan, M., Temi, P., Chamba, N., Chojnowski, D. S., Fanelli, M., Koekemoer, A., Laine, S., López-Rodríguez, E., et al. (2024) · Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ad3c37 · Cited by 3
Nandi, A., & Pandey, B. (2025) · Astronomy and Computing · doi:10.1016/j.ascom.2025.100972 · Cited by 3
“In this narrative, the primary mechanism driving galaxy growth is the accretion of gas from the intergalactic medium (IGM).”
Fabian, A. C. (1994) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-94-011-1022-8_20 · Cited by 3
Chabrier, G. (1998) · Journal of Physics Condensed Matter · doi:10.1088/0953-8984/10/49/013 · Cited by 3
“• Star formation process: Jeans stability analysis yields a minimum mass mmin ∼ 0.01M⊙, definitely in the BD domain (Silk, 1977).”
GRAVITATIONAL INSTABILITY THEORY OF GALAXY FORMATION AND CLUSTERING: SOME RECENT DEVELOPMENTS
Fall, S. M. (1980) · Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences · doi:10.1111/j.1749-6632.1980.tb15928.x · Cited by 3
Mohapatra, R. N., & Teplitz, V. L. (2001) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-662-04587-9_22 · Cited by 3
Metadata
- Authors
- Silk, J.
- Corresponding author
- Silk, J.
- ORCID
- Silk, J.
- Venue
- The Astrophysical Journal
- Publisher
- American Astronomical Society
- Published
- 1977-02
- Volume
- 211
- Pages
- 638
- ISSN
- 0004-637X (ISSN-L)
- 1538-4357
- OpenAlex
- W2010419548
- Semantic Scholar
- 2bcefe5b5fe76c98d49f4a6f7ed17cfd3ad2c452
- Cited by
- 510
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 4 · 2025: 14 · 2024: 12 · 2023: 17 · 2022: 10 · 2021: 13 · 2020: 13 · 2019: 16 · 2018: 20 · 2017: 21 · 2016: 18 · 2015: 20 · 2014: 18 · 2013: 12 · 2012: 17
- FWCI
- 8.41
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- The Astrophysical Journal (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Galaxies: Formation, Evolution, Phenomena
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Astrophysics and Star Formation Studies
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Stellar, planetary, and galactic studies
- Keywords
- galaxy formation, ionized gas clouds, cooling, molecular hydrogen cooling, binding energy, spheroidal galaxies, primordial gas clouds, second-generation stars, stellar mass distribution
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