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This work extends previous kinematic studies of young stars in the head of the Orion A cloud (OMC-1/2/3/4/5). It is based on large samples of infrared, optical, and X-ray selected pre-main-sequence stars with reliable radial velocities and Gaia -derived parallaxes and proper motions. Stellar kinematic groups are identified assuming they mimic the motion of their parental gas. Several groups are found to have peculiar kinematics: the NGC 1977 cluster and two stellar groups in the extended Orion nebula (EON) cavity are caught in the act of departing their birthplaces. The abnormal motion of NGC 1977 may have been caused by a global hierarchical cloud collapse, feedback by massive Ori OB1ab stars, supersonic turbulence, cloud–cloud collision, and/or slingshot effect; the former two models are favoured by us. EON groups might have inherited anomalous motions of their parental cloudlets due to small-scale 'rocket effects' from nearby OB stars. We also identify sparse stellar groups to the east and west of Orion A that are drifting from the central region, possibly a slowly expanding halo of the Orion nebula cluster. We confirm previously reported findings of varying line-of-sight distances to different parts of the cloud's Head with associated differences in gas velocity. 3D movies of star kinematics show contraction of the groups of stars in OMC-1 and global contraction of OMC-123 stars. Overall, the head of Orion A region exhibits complex motions consistent with theoretical models involving hierarchical gravitational collapse in (possibly turbulent) clouds with OB stellar feedback. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Photometric detections of dust circumstellar discs around pre-main sequence (PMS) stars, coupled with estimates of stellar ages, provide constraints on the time available for planet formation. Most previous studies on disc longevity, starting with Haisch, Lada & Lada, use star samples from PMS clusters but do not consider data sets with homogeneous photometric sensitivities and/or ages placed on a uniform time-scale. Here we conduct the largest study to date of the longevity of inner dust discs using X-ray and 1-8 μm infrared photometry from the MYStIX and SFiNCs projects for 69 young clusters in 32 nearby star-forming regions with ages t ≤ 5Myr. Cluster ages are derived by combining the empirical AgeJX method with PMS evolutionary models, which treat dynamo-generated magnetic fields in different ways. Leveraging X-ray data to identify disc-free objects, we impose similar stellar mass sensitivity limits for disc-bearing and disc-free young stellar objectswhile extending the analysis to stellar massesaslowas M ~ 0.1 M.... We ?nd that the disc longevity estimates are strongly affected by the choice of PMS evolutionarymodel. Assuming a disc fraction of 100 per cent at zero age, the inferred disc half-life changes signi?cantly, from t1/2 ~ 1.3-2 Myr to t1/2 ~ 3.5 Myr when switching from non-magnetic to magnetic PMS models. In addition, we ?nd no statistically signi?cant evidence that disc fraction varies with stellar mass within the ?rst few Myr of life for stars with masses <2M..., but our samples may not be complete for more massive stars. The effects of initial disc fraction and star-forming environment are also explored. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The SFiNCs (Star Formation in Nearby Clouds) project is an X-ray/infrared study of the young stellar populations in 22 star-forming regions with distances ≲1 kpc designed to extend our earlier MYStIX (Massive Young Star-Forming Complex Study in Infrared and X-ray) survey of more distant clusters. Our central goal is to give empirical constraints on cluster formation mechanisms. Using parametric mixture models applied homogeneously to the catalogue of SFiNCs young stars, we identify 52 SFiNCs clusters and 19 unclustered stellar structures. The procedure gives cluster properties including location, population, morphology, association with molecular clouds, absorption, age (AgeJX), and infrared spectral energy distribution (SED) slope. Absorption, SED slope, and AgeJX are age indicators. SFiNCs clusters are examined individually, and collectively with MYStIX clusters, to give the following results. (1) SFiNCs is dominated by smaller, younger, and more heavily obscured clusters than MYStIX. (2) SFiNCs cloud-associated clusters have the high ellipticities aligned with their host molecular filaments indicating morphology inherited from their parental clouds. (3) The effect of cluster expansion is evident from the radius-age, radius-absorption, and radius-SED correlations. Core radii increase dramatically from ~0.08 to ~0.9 pc over the age range 1-3.5Myr. Inferred gas removal time-scales are longer than 1 Myr. (4) Rich, spatially distributed stellar populations are present in SFiNCs clouds representing early generations of star formation. An appendix compares the performance of the mixture models and non-parametric minimum spanning tree to identify clusters. This work is a foundation for future SFiNCs/MYStIX studies including disc longevity, age gradients, and dynamical modelling. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The pace and pattern of star formation leading to rich young stellar clusters is quite uncertain. In this context, we analyse the spatial distribution of ages within 19 young (median t ≲ 3Myr on the Siess et al. time-scale), morphologically simple, isolated, and relatively rich stellar clusters. Our analysis is based on young stellar object (YSO) samples from the Massive Young Star-Forming Complex Study in Infrared and X-ray and Star Formation in Nearby Clouds surveys, and a new estimator of pre-main sequence (PMS) stellar ages, AgeJX, derived from X-ray and near-infrared photometric data. Median cluster ages are computed within four annular subregions of the clusters. We confirm and extend the earlier result of Getman et al. (2014): 80 per cent of the clusters show age trends where stars in cluster cores are younger than in outer regions. Our cluster stacking analyses establish the existence of an age gradient to high statistical significance in several ways. Time-scales vary with the choice of PMS evolutionary model; the inferred median age gradient across the studied clusters ranges from 0.75 to 1.5Myr pc-1. The empirical finding reported in the present study - late or continuing formation of stars in the cores of star clusters with older stars dispersed in the outer regions - has a strong foundation with other observational studies and with the astrophysical models like the global hierarchical collapse model of V'azquez-Semadeni et al. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]