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Sniperman724
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If a typical star is created by a spinning ball of gas, how does the gas start spinning in the first place to fuel that birth?
Sniperman724 said:If a typical star is created by a spinning ball of gas, how does the gas start spinning in the first place to fuel that birth?
Stars form when a large cloud of gas and dust, known as a molecular cloud, collapses under its own gravity. As the cloud collapses, it heats up and begins to spin, forming a flattened disk shape. The gas and dust in the disk then clumps together and eventually becomes dense enough to ignite nuclear fusion, creating a star.
The gas in molecular clouds can have small random motions, but overall it tends to rotate due to the conservation of angular momentum. This means that as the cloud collapses, the rotation speeds up, just like an ice skater spinning faster as they pull their arms in.
As the gas and dust in the disk clump together, they become denser and hotter. Eventually, the temperature and pressure in the center of the clump becomes high enough for nuclear fusion to occur, which releases a tremendous amount of energy. This energy helps to counteract the force of gravity and allows the clump to continue growing and eventually form a star.
No, there are different processes that can lead to star formation. For example, low-mass stars like our Sun form from collapsing molecular clouds, while high-mass stars may form through the merging of smaller clumps or from the collapse of much larger gas clouds. Additionally, the exact details of the star formation process can vary depending on factors such as the temperature and density of the initial gas cloud.
The timescale for star formation depends on the size and mass of the gas cloud, as well as the environment it is in. Smaller, low-mass stars can form in a few million years, while larger, high-mass stars may take tens of millions of years. However, the overall process of gas collapsing and accumulating into a dense enough core to ignite fusion can take anywhere from tens of thousands to millions of years.