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Over the past decade it has become increasingly clear that circumstellar disks play a central role in the formation and evolution of stellar systems. The observational evidence for the presence of disks has been based primarily on their emission characteristics at millimeter and infrared wavelengths. Moreover, such observations of mainly isolated single-star systems have laid the foundation for theoretical models of star formation. However, there is growing evidence that the majority of stars form in embedded clusters rather than in isolation. Recent near infrared imaging studies of young embedded clusters suggest that disks are also present in these environments but it is unclear whether the formation and evolution of disks is similar in cluster and noncluster environments. To investigate these issues, we have initiated a coordinated near infrared imaging and millimeter interferometric study of a sample of embedded clusters ranging in age from 1 to 10 million years old. The goals of this project are to determine the frequency, properties and lifetimes of circumstellar disks in clusters. In this presentation we present the initial results for two clusters in our sample, IC 348 and NGC 2024.
