A Massive Star is Born: How Stellar Feedback Regulates Accretion onto Massive Stars
Massive stars play an essential role in the Universe. They are rare, yet the energy and momentum they inject into the interstellar medium (i.e., stellar feedback) dominate the energetics of star-forming regions, impacting both star and galaxy formation. Massive stars form from the gravitational collapse of magnetized, dense, and turbulent molecular gas in Giant Molecular Clouds (GMCs). During their formation, feedback mechanisms – including intense radiation fields, collimated protostellar outflows, and fast stellar winds – may limit their growth by accretion. Understanding this complex interplay requires detailed radiation magnetohydrodynamic (RMHD) simulations. In this talk, I will present how simulations have advanced our understanding of massive star formation and describe the impact and importance of these feedback processes. Additionally, I will discuss how such simulations can help interpret multi-wavelength observations and motivate how massive stars most likely form in regions within GMCs that are supplied mass via large-scale, high ram-pressure dynamical inflows in agreement with observations of massive star-forming regions.
