1994A&A...287..517R

A scenario is proposed which allows a simple explanation of the observed properties of the stellar Initial Mass Function (IMF) by principles of domain packing. If a space volume is filled up with smaller subvolumes (=fragments), the condition that the fragments may not overlap results in a biasing towards small fragment radii. The distribution of volumes (=masses) resemble the properties of actually observed IMFs, provided that the fragments occupy a significant fraction of the available space volume and that either no characteristic radius exists among fragment radii or that the intrinsic distribution of radii is not peaked too sharply. In the high mass domain, the distribution of fragment masses is well described by a power law with a Salpeter-like exponent. This spectrum becomes progressively flatter towards smaller masses, in agreement to what has been observed for example in the Pleiades. This behaviour offers a way to understand the relation between the alternate descriptions of the field star IMF as a power-law or a "log-normal" law.