Kong You Liow

Young massive clusters (YMCs) are recently formed astronomical objects with unusually high star formation rates. We propose the collision of giant molecular clouds (GMCs) as a likely formation mechanism of YMCs, consistent with the YMC conveyor-belt formation mode concluded by other authors. We conducted smoothed particle hydrodynamical simulations of cloud-cloud collisions, and show that greater collision speed, greater initial cloud density, and lower turbulence increase the overall star formation rate. These conditions produce clusters with greater cluster mass, some even resembling the observed Milky Way YMCs. We also investigate grouped star formation, whereby sink particles are grouped as larger star-forming regions, then are used to sample the initial mass function of stars. Having individual stars in the simulations will prepare us for the inclusion of stellar feedback in our colliding clouds simulations in the future.