An Etymological Dictionary of Astronomy and Astrophysics
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1) General: The act or state of growing together, as similar parts; the act of uniting by natural affinity or attraction; the state of being united.
2) Merging of the stars composing a → binary system after having undergone → supernova explosion. General relativity predicts that binary systems of → compact objects will emit energy in the form of → gravitational radiation, and that this loss of energy eventually will lead to the coalescence of the system.

Verbal noun from → coalesce.

A scenario for building up → massive stars through merging of → intermediate-mass protostars. It occurs in the cores of dense stellar clusters that have undergone core contraction due to rapid → accretion of gas with low → specific angular momentum. The required densities are, however, very high, 10⁸ stars pc^-3, which are extremely rare (Bonnell et al. 1998, MNRAS 298, 93).

→ coalescence; → model.