Subject: [IAU 174 abstract 19 ]

From: iau174
Date: Sun, 13 Aug 95 02:50:34 JST

>From [email-masked]  Sun Aug 13 02:50:21 1995
Date: Sat, 12 Aug 1995 19:38:42 +0200
From: [email-masked] (Enrico Vesperini)
To: [email-masked]

E. Vesperini, D.F. Chernoff
TRUNCATION OF THE BINARY DISTRIBUTION FUNCTION IN GLOBULAR CLUSTER FORMATION

We investigate a population of primordial binaries during the initial
stage of evolution of a star cluster.  For our calculations we assume
that equal mass stars form rapidly in a tidally truncated gas cloud,
that $\sim10$\% of the stars are in binaries and that the resulting
star cluster undergoes an epoch of violent relaxation.  We study the
collisional interaction of the binaries and single stars, in
particular, the ionization of the binaries and the energy exchange
between binaries and single stars.  We find that for large $N$ systems
($N > 10^3$) even the most violent beginning leaves the binary
distribution function largely intact. Hence, the binding energy
originally tied up in the cloud's protostellar pairs is preserved
during the relaxation process and the binaries
are available to interact at later times within the virialized cluster.