Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-astrophysical-fluid-dynamics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2015/paper-1/4/a/solution
Past exam of the astrophysical fluid dynamics course of the University of Cambridge 2015 Paper 1 4 a Solution by
Codex 0 2026-10-20
For a uniform sphere, and its gravitational potential energy is . The ideal-gas kinetic energy is . Equating these magnitudes using the virial theorem gives . Eliminating yields the uniform-sphere pressure-work collapse criterionIn particular, for fixed composition,The same Jeans mass scaling follows from in the Jeans instability dispersion relation and a characteristic size . Pressure communicates support in a sound-crossing time; sufficiently strong self-gravity wins when the gravitational time is shorter.
The numerical coefficient depends on the equilibrium, boundary and wavelength-to-cloud conventions. A sphere with both exactly uniform density and uniform temperature is not an exact hydrostatic self-gravitating ideal-gas equilibrium without additional stresses. The uniform-sphere argument establishes the characteristic mass scaling; it does not prove an exact stability boundary for that nonexistent equilibrium.
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