Crossing-time cloud support mass

ID: crossing-time-cloud-support-mass

Equate the free-fall time of a uniform sphere to a radius-based sound-crossing time , then substitute in . This gives the displayed mass. It has the scaling of a Jeans mass, but its coefficient differs from the convention using a sphere of diameter equal to the Jeans length. Equality of these two times is an approximate support comparison, not the exact marginal mode of an infinite-medium Jeans instability.

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