18 research outputs found
Ground-state ammonia and water in absorption towards Sgr B2
We have used the Odin submillimetre-wave satellite telescope to observe the
ground state transitions of ortho-ammonia and ortho-water, including their 15N,
18O, and 17O isotopologues, towards Sgr B2. The extensive simultaneous velocity
coverage of the observations, >500 km/s, ensures that we can probe the
conditions of both the warm, dense gas of the molecular cloud Sgr B2 near the
Galactic centre, and the more diffuse gas in the Galactic disk clouds along the
line-of-sight. We present ground-state NH3 absorption in seven distinct
velocity features along the line-of-sight towards Sgr B2. We find a nearly
linear correlation between the column densities of NH3 and CS, and a
square-root relation to N2H+. The ammonia abundance in these diffuse Galactic
disk clouds is estimated to be about (0.5-1)e-8, similar to that observed for
diffuse clouds in the outer Galaxy. On the basis of the detection of H218O
absorption in the 3 kpc arm, and the absence of such a feature in the H217O
spectrum, we conclude that the water abundance is around 1e-7, compared to
~1e-8 for NH3. The Sgr B2 molecular cloud itself is seen in absorption in NH3,
15NH3, H2O, H218O, and H217O, with emission superimposed on the absorption in
the main isotopologues. The non-LTE excitation of NH3 in the environment of Sgr
B2 can be explained without invoking an unusually hot (500 K) molecular layer.
A hot layer is similarly not required to explain the line profiles of the
1_{1,0}-1_{0,1} transition from H2O and its isotopologues. The relatively weak
15NH3 absorption in the Sgr B2 molecular cloud indicates a high [14N/15N]
isotopic ratio >600. The abundance ratio of H218O and H217O is found to be
relatively low, 2.5--3. These results together indicate that the dominant
nucleosynthesis process in the Galactic centre is CNO hydrogen burning.Comment: 10 pages, 5 figure
Quaternion Solution for the Rock'n'roller: Box Orbits, Loop Orbits and Recession
We consider two types of trajectories found in a wide range of mechanical
systems, viz. box orbits and loop orbits. We elucidate the dynamics of these
orbits in the simple context of a perturbed harmonic oscillator in two
dimensions. We then examine the small-amplitude motion of a rigid body, the
rock'n'roller, a sphere with eccentric distribution of mass. The equations of
motion are expressed in quaternionic form and a complete analytical solution is
obtained. Both types of orbit, boxes and loops, are found, the particular form
depending on the initial conditions. We interpret the motion in terms of
epi-elliptic orbits. The phenomenon of recession, or reversal of precession, is
associated with box orbits. The small-amplitude solutions for the symmetric
case, or Routh sphere, are expressed explicitly in terms of epicycles; there is
no recession in this case