The Enigma of Jets and Outows from Young Stars

Recent Advances in Star Formation: Observations and Theory, Bengaluru, India, 29 June - 1 July 2011Research in recent decades has seen many important advances in understanding the role of jets and outflows in the star formation process. Although, many open issues still remain, multi-wavelength high resolution observations have provided unprecedented insights into these bizarre phenomena. An overview of some of the current research is given, in which great strides have been made in addressing fundamental questions such as: how are jets generated? what is the jet acceleration mechanism? how are jets collimated? what is the relationship between accretion and ejection? how does mass accretion proceed? do jets somehow extract angular momentum? and finally, is there a universal mechanism for jet generation on all scales from brown dwarfs to AGNs