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Cited by 1,011

The DOI matches its Crossref record.

The rate of star formation in normal disk galaxies

Kennicutt, R. C., Jr.·1983·The Astrophysical Journal
DOI 10.1086/161261
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Abstract

Photometry of the integrated Hα emission in a large sample of field spiral and irregular galaxies has been used to obtain quantitative estimates of the total star formation rate (SFR) in the galaxies. The photoionization properties of a stellar population have been modeled for a variety of choices for the initial mass function (IMF). Excellent agreement with the observed galaxy colors and Hα emission is obtained with models using an IMF slope close to Salpeter's original value. The extinction-corrected star formation rates are large, as high as 20 M_sun; yr-1 in giant Sc galaxies. The current rates in late-type galaxies are comparable to the past rates averaged over the age of the disk. Little evidence is found for a strong correlation between the SFR and average gas density. Comparison of the present SFRs with the remaining supply of interstellar gas yields consumption time scales of only a few times 109 years in most cases.

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Metadata

Authors
Kennicutt, R. C., Jr.
Venue
The Astrophysical Journal
Publisher
American Astronomical Society
Published
1983-09
Volume
272
Pages
54
ISSN
  • 0004-637X (ISSN-L)
  • 1538-4357
DOI
10.1086/161261
OpenAlex
W2145321334
Cited by
1,011
References
0
FWCI
10.16
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed

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CoChat. (2026). Citation check: The rate of star formation in normal disk galaxies. https://app.cochat.ai/papers/10.1086/161261
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Kennicutt, R. C., Jr. (1983). The rate of star formation in normal disk galaxies. The Astrophysical Journal. https://doi.org/10.1086/161261

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Bibliographic data: Semantic Scholar, OpenAlex, Crossref.

Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).

Semantic Scholar’s data is described in: Kinney, R., et al. (2023). The Semantic Scholar Open Data Platform. arXiv:2301.10140.