We have measured the present accretion rate of roughly 800 low-mass ( \sim 1 - 1.4 ~ { } M _ { \sun } ) pre-Main Sequence stars in the field of Supernova 1987A in the Large Magellanic Cloud ( LMC , Z \simeq 0.3 Z _ { \sun } ) .
It is the first time that this fundamental parameter for star formation is determined for low-mass stars outside our Galaxy .
The Balmer continuum emission used to derive the accretion rate positively correlates with the \mathrm { H } \alpha excess .
Both these phenomena are believed to originate from accretion from a circumstellar disk so that their simultaneous detection provides an important confirmation of the pre-Main Sequence nature of the \mathrm { H } \alpha and UV excess objects , which are likely to be the LMC equivalent of Galactic Classical T Tauri stars .
The stars with statistically significant excesses are measured to have accretion rates larger than \sim 1.5 \times 10 ^ { -8 } M _ { \sun } yr ^ { -1 } at an age of 12-16 Myrs .
For comparison , the time scale for disk dissipation observed in the Galaxy is of the order of 6 Myrs .
Moreover , the oldest Classical T Tauri star known in the Milky Way ( TW Hydræ , with 10 Myrs of age ) has a measured accretion rate of only 5 \times 10 ^ { -10 } ~ { } M _ { \sun } / yr , i.e . 30 times less than what we measure for stars at a comparable age in the LMC .
Our findings indicate that metallicity plays a major role in regulating the formation of low-mass stars .