Cooling-to-free-fall equality curve
ID: cooling-to-free-fall-equality-curve
Equating the optically thin cooling time to the uniform-sphere free-fall time gives a critical gas density proportional to . With hydrogen mass fraction , particle ratio and gravitating gas fraction , it is . At fixed temperature, gas above this density cools faster than free fall. A smaller gravitating gas fraction moves the boundary upward because gravity is faster at a fixed gas density.
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