71 research outputs found
The Life Cycle of Dust
Dust offers a unique probe of the interstellar medium (ISM) across multiple size, density, and temperature scales. Dust is detected in outflows of evolved stars, star-forming molecular clouds, planet-forming disks, and even in galaxies at the dawn of the Universe. These grains also have a profound effect on various astrophysical phenomena from thermal balance and extinction in galaxies to the building blocks for planets, and changes in dust grain properties will affect all of these phenomena. A full understanding of dust in all of its forms and stages requires a multi-disciplinary investigation of the dust life cycle. Such an investigation can be achieved with a statistical study of dust properties across stellar evolution, star and planet formation, and redshift. Current and future instrumentation will enable this investigation through fast and sensitive observations in dust continuum, polarization, and spectroscopy from near-infrared to millimeter wavelengths
The Kinematic and Chemical Properties of a Potential Core-Forming Clump: Perseus B1-E
We present 13CO and C18O (1-0), (2-1), and (3-2) maps towards the
core-forming Perseus B1-E clump using observations from the James Clerk Maxwell
Telescope (JCMT), Submillimeter Telescope (SMT) of the Arizona Radio
Observatory, and IRAM 30 m telescope. We find that the 13CO and C18O line
emission both have very complex velocity structures, indicative of multiple
velocity components within the ambient gas. The (1-0) transitions reveal a
radial velocity gradient across B1-E of 1 km/s/pc that increases from
north-west to south-east, whereas the majority of the Perseus cloud has a
radial velocity gradient increasing from south-west to north-east. In contrast,
we see no evidence of a velocity gradient associated with the denser
Herschel-identified substructures in B1-E. Additionally, the denser
substructures have much lower systemic motions than the ambient clump material,
which indicates that they are likely decoupled from the large-scale gas.
Nevertheless, these substructures themselves have broad line widths (0.4 km/s)
similar to that of the C18O gas in the clump, which suggests they inherited
their kinematic properties from the larger-scale, moderately dense gas.
Finally, we find evidence of C18O depletion only toward one substructure,
B1-E2, which is also the only object with narrow (transonic) line widths. We
suggest that as prestellar cores form, their chemical and kinematic properties
are linked in evolution, such that these objects must first dissipate their
turbulence before they deplete in CO.Comment: Accepted by ApJ, 34 pages, 12 figure
Acceleration and Substructure Constraints in a Quasar Outflow
We present observations of probable line-of-sight acceleration of a broad
absorption trough of C IV in the quasar SDSS J024221.87+004912.6. We also
discuss how the velocity overlap of two other outflowing systems in the same
object constrains the properties of the outflows. The Si IV doublet in each
system has one unblended transition and one transition which overlaps with
absorption from the other system. The residual flux in the overlapping trough
is well fit by the product of the residual fluxes in the unblended troughs. For
these optically thick systems to yield such a result, at least one of them must
consist of individual subunits rather than being a single structure with
velocity-dependent coverage of the source. If these subunits are identical,
opaque, spherical clouds, we estimate the cloud radius to be r = 3.9 10^15 cm.
If they are identical, opaque, linear filaments, we estimate their width to be
w = 6.5 10^14 cm. These subunits are observed to cover the Mg II broad emission
line region of the quasar, at which distance from the black hole the above
filament width is equal to the predicted scale height of the outer atmosphere
of a thin accretion disk. Insofar as that scale height is a natural size scale
for structures originating in an accretion disk, these observations are
evidence that the accretion disk can be a source of quasar absorption systems.
Based on data from ESO program 075.B-0190(A).Comment: 14 emulateapj pages, 7 figures, ApJ in pres
The VLA/ALMA Nascent Disk and Multiplicity (VANDAM) Survey of Perseus Protostars. VI. Characterizing the Formation Mechanism for Close Multiple Systems
We present Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) observations
of multiple protostar systems in the Perseus molecular cloud previously
detected by the Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA). We observed 17 close
(600~AU separation) multiple systems at 1.3~mm in continuum and five
molecular lines (i.e., \twco, \cateo, \thco, HCO, SO) to characterize the
circum-multiple environments in which these systems are forming. We detect at
least one component in the continuum for the 17 multiple systems. In three
systems, one companion is not detected, and for two systems the companions are
unresolved at our observed resolution. We also detect circum-multiple dust
emission toward 8 out of 9 Class 0 multiples. Circum-multiple dust emission is
not detected toward any of the 8 Class I multiples. Twelve systems are detected
in the dense gas tracers toward their disks/inner envelopes. For these 12
systems, we use the dense gas observations to characterize their formation
mechanism. The velocity gradients in the circum-multiple gas are clearly
orthogonal to the outflow directions in 8 out of the 12 systems, consistent
with disk fragmentation. Moreover, only two systems with separations 200~AU
are \textit{inconsistent} with disk fragmentation, in addition to the two
widest systems (500~AU). Our results suggest that disk fragmentation via
gravitational instability is an important formation mechanism for close
multiple systems, but further statistics are needed to better determine the
relative fraction formed via this method.Comment: 48 Pages, 26 Figures, 7 Tables, Accepted by Ap
An ALMA Search for Substructure, Fragmentation, and Hidden Protostars in Starless Cores in Chamaeleon I
We present an Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) 106 GHz
(Band 3) continuum survey of the complete population of dense cores in the
Chamaeleon I molecular cloud. We detect a total of 24 continuum sources in 19
different target fields. All previously known Class 0 and Class I protostars in
Chamaeleon I are detected, whereas all of the 56 starless cores in our sample
are undetected. We show that the Spitzer+Herschel census of protostars in
Chamaeleon I is complete, with the rate at which protostellar cores have been
misclassified as starless cores calculated as <1/56, or < 2%. We use synthetic
observations to show that starless cores collapsing following the turbulent
fragmentation scenario are detectable by our ALMA observations when their
central densities exceed ~10^8 cm^-3, with the exact density dependent on the
viewing geometry. Bonnor-Ebert spheres, on the other hand, remain undetected to
central densities at least as high as 10^10 cm^-3. Our starless core
non-detections are used to infer that either the star formation rate is
declining in Chamaeleon I and most of the starless cores are not collapsing,
matching the findings of previous studies, or that the evolution of starless
cores are more accurately described by models that develop less substructure
than predicted by the turbulent fragmentation scenario, such as Bonnor-Ebert
spheres. We outline future work necessary to distinguish between these two
possibilities.Comment: Accepted by Ap
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