The gentle CMF of high-mass star-forming regions

¹ European Southern Observatory, Karl-Schwarzschild-Str. 2, 85748 Garching, Germany
² Max-Planck-Institut für Astronomie, Königstuhl 17, 69117 Heidelberg, Germany
³ Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, 60 Garden Street, USA

Abstract

We derive the core mass functions (CMFs) of three high-mass star forming regions from interferometric mm observations of their dust emission, obtaining power-law slopes β ∼−2.2 (similar to the Salpeter IMF), β ∼−1.6, and β ∼−1.7. The CMF were obtained with the same procedure and the regions are similar in mass and luminosity. The cause for the difference in slopes is uncertain, but our results suggest that the shape of the CMF is not the only constraint for the shape of the IMF.