This relationship is described by the Initial Mass Function (IMF). For more than half a century, astronomers have assumed that the IMF is a universal relationship, i.e., it is uniform throughout ...

The Stellar Initial Mass Function is a function that describes relativefractionsof stars having different masses in a stellar system or a ratio of big and small stars in galaxies.

A study of the stellar kinematics of a large sample of early-type galaxies provides evidence that the stellar initial mass function depends on the galaxy’s stellar mass-to-light ratio and thus ...

Gilles Chabrier, Galactic Stellar and Substellar Initial Mass Function, Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, Vol. 115, No. 809 (July 2003), pp. 763-795 ...