Protostellar Jets: The Best Laboratories for Investigating Astrophysical Jets

Abstract

Highly collimated supersonic jets are observed to emerge from a wide variety of astrophysical objects, ranging from Active Nuclei of Galaxies (AGN's) to Young Stellar Objects (YSOs) within our own Galaxy. Despite their different physical scales (in size, velocity, and amount of energy transported), they have strong morphological similarities. Thanks to the proximity and relatively small timescales, which permit direct observations of evolutionary changes, YSO jets are, perhaps, the best laboratories for cosmic jet investigation. In this lecture, the formation, structure, and evolution of the YSO jets are reviewed with the help of observational information, MHD and purely hydrodynamical modeling, and numerical simulations. Possible applications of the models to AGN jets are also addressed.