Observational approach to star formation

The observational approach to the early stages of stellar evolution has been applied to some problems relating to the formation and dissipation of stellar associations, the origin of OB field stars, and low-mass star formation in OB associations. The OB field stars ejected from parent associations are older on the average than the OB stars in the associations. The average duration of active OB-star formation in associations is evaluated. It is suggested that, under the conditions in OB associations, low-mass stars may be formed from dense protostellar objects.Translated fromAstrofizika, Vol. 39, No. 3, pp. 393–406, July–September, 1996.