Question

True or false? A protostellar cloud spins faster as it contracts

Answer 1

Answer:

No. The protostellar cloud spins faster in the collapsing stage (stage 1) and becomes much slower in the contraction stage (stage 2)

Explanation:

Once the cloud is so dense that the heat which is being produced in its center cannot easily escape, pressure rapidly rises, and catches up with the weight, or whatever external force is causing the cloud to collapse, and the cloud becomes stable, as a protostellar cloud.

The protostellar cloud will become more dense over thousands of years. This stage of decreasing size is known as a contraction, rather than a collapse. In the contraction stage the cloud has become much slower, and because weight and pressure are more or less in balance. In the first stage of formation, the decrease of size is very rapid, and compressive forces completely overwhelm the pressure of the gas, and we say that the cloud is collapsing.