1,159 research outputs found
Sgr A East and its surroundings observed in X-rays
We report the results of an XMM-Newton observation of Sgr A East and its
surroundings. The X-ray spectrum of Sgr A East is well represented with a
two-temperature plasma model with temperatures of ~1 and ~4 keV. Only the iron
abundance shows clear spatial variation; it concentrates in the core of Sgr A
East. The derived plasma parameters suggest that Sgr A East originated in a
single supernova. Around Sgr A East, there is a broad distribution of hard
X-ray emission with a superimposed soft excess component extending away from
the location of Sgr A East both above and below the plane. We discuss the
nature of these structures as well as the close vicinity of Sgr A*.Comment: 7 pages, 3 figures, Accepted for publication in Advances in Space
Research, as a proceeding paper for the 34th COSPAR E1.4 "High Energy Studies
of Supernova Remnants and Neutron stars" held at Houston, Texas, USA during
10-19 Oct 2002; also found in
http://www.star.le.ac.uk/~mas/research/paper/#Sakano2003cos
Improving the mesomorphic behaviour of supramolecular liquid crystals by resonance-assisted hydrogen bonding
A systematic structure-property relationship study on hydrogen-bonded liquid crystals was performed, revealing the impact of resonance-assisted hydrogen bonds (RAHBs) on the self-assembling behavior of the supramolecular architecture. The creation of a six-membered intramolecular hydrogen-bonded ring acts as a counterpart to the self-organization between hydrogen bond donators and acceptors and determines thus the suprastructure. Variation of the hydrogen-bonding pattern allowed us to significantly improve the temperature range of the reported liquid crystalline assemblies
Interferometric mapping of Magnetic fields: G30.79 FIR 10
We present polarization maps of G30.79 FIR 10 (in W43) from thermal dust
emission at 1.3 mm and from CO J= line emission. The observations were
obtained using the Berkeley-Illinois-Maryland Association array in the period
2002-2004. The G30.79 FIR 10 region shows an ordered polarization pattern in
dust emission, which suggests an hourglass shape for the magnetic field. Only
marginal detections for line polarization were made from this region.
Application of the Chandrashkar-Fermi method yielded mG
and a statistically corrected mass to magnetic flux ratio , or essentially critical.Comment: 11 pages, 2 Figures, Published in Ap
A Model of the EGRET Source at the Galactic Center: Inverse Compton Scattering Within Sgr A East and its Halo
Continuum low-frequency radio observations of the Galactic Center reveal the
presence of two prominent radio sources, Sgr A East and its surrounding Halo,
containing non-thermal particle distributions with power-law indices around
2.5-3.3 and 2.4, respectively. The central 1-2 pc region is also a source of
intense (stellar) UV and (dust-reprocessed) far-IR radiation that bathes these
extended synchrotron-emitting structures. A recent detection of gamma-rays
(2EGJ1746-2852) from within around 1 degree of the Galactic Center by EGRET
onboard the Compton GRO shows that the emission from this environment extends
to very high energies.
We suggest that inverse Compton scatterings between the power-law electrons
inferred from the radio properties of Sgr A East and its Halo, and the UV and
IR photons from the nucleus, may account for the possibly diffuse gamma-ray
source as well. We show that both particle distributions may be contributing to
the gamma-ray emission, though their relevant strength depends on the actual
physical properties (such as the magnetic field intensity) in each source. If
this picture is correct, the high-energy source at the Galactic Center is
extended over several arcminutes, which can be tested with thenext generation
of gamma-ray and hard X-ray missions.Comment: latex, 14 pages, 3 figures (accepted for publication in ApJ
High-resolution Observations of OH(1720 MHz) Masers Toward the Galactic Center
High-resolution VLA observations of 1720 MHz OH maser emission from Sgr A
East and the circumnuclear disk with spatial and spectral resolutions of
2\dasec5 1\dasec3 and 0.27 \kms are reported. This follow-up
observational study focuses on the recent discovery of a number of such OH
maser features and their intense circularly polarized maser lines detected
toward these Galactic center sources. The 1720 MHz maser line of OH arises from
collisionally excited gas behind a C-type shock and is an important diagnostic
of the interaction process that may occur between molecular clouds and
associated X-ray emitting shell-type supernova remnants. The present
observations have confirmed that the observed Stokes signal is due to
Zeeman splitting and that the OH masers are angularly broadened by the
scattering medium toward the Galactic center. The scale length of the magnetic
field fluctuations in the scattering medium toward the Galactic center is
estimated to be greater than 0.1-0.2 pc using the correlation of the position
angles of the scatter-broadened maser spots. In addition, the kinematics of the
maser spots associated with Sgr A East are used to place a 5 pc displacement
between this extended radio structure and the Galactic center.Comment: 13 pages, 2 Tables and 2 figures, to be published in Ap
The Escape of Ionizing Photons from OB Associations in Disk Galaxies: Radiation Transfer Through Superbubbles
By solving the time-dependent radiation transfer problem of stellar radiation
through evolving superbubbles within a smoothly varying HI distribution, we
estimate the fraction of ionizing photons emitted by OB associations that
escapes the HI disk of our Galaxy into the halo and intergalactic medium (IGM).
We consider both coeval star-formation and a Gaussian star-formation history
with a time spread sigma_t = 2 Myr. We consider both a uniform H I distribution
and a two-phase (cloud/intercloud) model, with a negligible filling factor of
hot gas. We find that the shells of the expanding superbubbles quickly trap or
attenuate the ionizing flux, so that most of the escaping radiation escapes
shortly after the formation of the superbubble. For the coeval star-formation
history, the total fraction of Lyman Continuum photons that escape both sides
of the disk in the solar vicinity is f_esc approx 0.15 +/- 0.05. For the
Gaussian star formation history, f_esc approx 0.06 +/- 0.03, a value roughly a
factor of two lower than the results of Dove & Shull (1994), where superbubbles
were not considered. For a local production rate of ionizing photons Psi_LyC =
4.95 X 10^7 cm^{-2} s^{-1}, the flux escaping the disk is Phi_LyC approx
(1.5-3.0) X 10^6 cm^{-2} s^{-1} for coeval and Gaussian star formation,
comparable to the flux required to sustain the Reynolds layer.Comment: Revised version (expanded), accepted for publication by ApJ, 38
pages, 8 figures, aasms4.sty and aabib.sty files include
Interferometric Mapping of Magnetic fields: NGC2071IR
We present polarization maps of NGC2071IR from thermal dust emission at 1.3
mm and from CO J= line emission. The observations were obtained using
the Berkeley-Illinois-Maryland Association array in the period 2002-2004. We
detected dust and line polarized emission from NGC2071IR that we used to
constrain the morphology of the magnetic field. From CO J= polarized
emission we found evidence for a magnetic field in the powerful bipolar outflow
present in this region. We calculated a visual extinction mag from our dust observations. This result, when compared with early
single dish work, seems to show that dust grains emit polarized radiation
efficiently at higher densities than previously thought. Mechanical alignment
by the outflow is proposed to explain the polarization pattern observed in
NGC2071IR, which is consistent with the observed flattening in this source.Comment: 17 pages, 4 Figures, Accepted for publication in Ap
XMM-Newton observations of Sagittarius A East
We present an analysis of a recent XMM-Newton observation of Sgr A East, a
supernova remnant located close to the Galactic Centre. Very high quality X-ray
spectra reveal many emission lines from highly ionized atoms consistent with a
multi-temperature thin thermal plasma in ionization equilibrium. We use a
two-temperature model to fit the spectra and derive temperatures of 1 keV and 4
keV. There is significant concentration of iron towards the centre of the X-ray
source such that the iron abundance varies from ~4 times solar in the core down
to ~0.5 solar in the outer regions, which contrasts with the rather uniform
distribution of other metals such as sulfur, argon and calcium, which have
abundances in the range 1--3. The derived total energy, mass, and the abundance
pattern are consistent with a single supernova event, either of type-Ia or
type-II origin, involving a relatively low-mass progenitor star. A weak 6.4-keV
neutral iron fluorescence line is also detected, the illumination source most
likely being Sgr A East itself. The morphology and spectral characteristics of
Sgr A East show no clear linkage to putative past activity in Sgr A*.Comment: 12 pages, 8 figures, to appear in MNRAS, figures with full resolution
available at http://www.star.le.ac.uk/~mas/research/paper/#Sakano2003mnra
Early differentiation of magmatic iron meteorite parent bodies from MnâCr chronometry
Magmatic iron meteorite groups such as IIAB, IIIAB and IVA, represent the largest sampling of extraterrestrial core material from the earliest accreted distinct planetary bodies in the solar system. Chromium isotope compositions of chromite/daubrĂ©elite from seven samples, translated into 53Cr/52Cr model ages, provide robust time information on planetary core formation. These ages are within âŒ1.5 Ma after formation of calcium-aluminium-rich inclusions (CAIs) and define the time of metal core formation in the respective parent bodies, assuming metalâsilicate separation was an instantaneous event that induced strong chemical fractionation of Mn from the more siderophile Cr. The early core formation ages support accretion and differentiation of the magmatic iron meteorite parent bodies to have occurred prior to the chondrule formation interval. The calibration of MnâCr ages with established HfâW ages of samples from the same magmatic iron meteorite groups constrains the initial É53Cr of the solar system to â0.30â±â0.05, and thus lower than previously estimated
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