International Summer Institute for Modeling in Astrophysics

The collapse of star-forming molecular clouds depends critically on radiation feedback from embedded protostars. In general, radiative heating raises the local Jeans mass, helping the gas resist fragmentation. However, the strength of this effect should depend on the metallicity of the star-forming region through its effect on the dust opacity, which determines the level of coupling between the matter and the radiation. In this project, we perform a series of AMR radiation-hydrodynamic simulations with the ORION code to determine what effect varying this coupling has on the star formation process.