Hierarchical hub-filament structures and gas inflows on galaxy-cloud scales

Zhou, Jian-Wen and Davis, Timothy ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4932-9379 2024. Hierarchical hub-filament structures and gas inflows on galaxy-cloud scales. Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia 41 , e076. 10.1017/pasa.2024.47

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Abstract

We investigated the kinematics and dynamics of gas structures on galaxy-cloud scales in two spiral galaxies NGC5236 (M83) and NGC4321 (M100) using CO (2–1) line. We utilized the FILFINDER algorithm on integrated intensity maps for the identification of filaments in two galaxies. Clear fluctuations in velocity and density were observed along these filaments, enabling the fitting of velocity gradients around intensity peaks. The variations in velocity gradient across different scales suggest a gradual and consistent increase in velocity gradient from large to small scales, indicative of gravitational collapse, something also revealed by the correlation between velocity dispersion and column density of gas structures. Gas structures at different scales in the galaxy may be organized into hierarchical systems through gravitational coupling. All the features of gas kinematics on galaxy-cloud scale are very similar to that on cloud-clump and clump-core scales studied in previous works. Thus, the interstellar medium from galaxy to dense core scales presents multi-scale/hierarchical hub-filament structures. Like dense core as the hub in clump, clump as the hub in molecular cloud, now we verify that cloud or cloud complex can be the hub in spiral galaxies. Although the scaling relations and the measured velocity gradients support the gravitational collapse of gas structures on galaxy-cloud scales, the collapse is much slower than a pure free-fall gravitational collapse.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Published Online
Status:	Published
Schools:	Physics and Astronomy
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
ISSN:	1323-3580
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	7 June 2024
Date of Acceptance:	31 May 2024
Last Modified:	03 Dec 2024 14:00
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/169592

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