Mapping magnetic fields in star forming regions with BLASTPol

Fissel, Laura M., Ade, Peter ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5127-0401, Angile, Francesco E., Ashton, Peter, Benton, Steven J., Devlin, Mark J., Dober, Bradley, Fukui, Yasuo, Gailtzki, Nicholas B., Gandilo, Natalie, Klein, J. R., Li, Zhi-Yun, Korotkov, Andrei, Martin, Peter G., Matthews, Tristan, Moncelsi, Lorenzo, Nakamura, Fumitaka, Barth Netterfield, Calvin, Novak, Giles, Pascale, Enzo, Poidevin, Frederick, Pereira Santos, Fabio, Savini, Giorgio, Scott, Douglas, Shariff, Jamil, Soler, Juan D., Thomas, Nicholas, Tucker, Carole ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1851-3918, Tucker, Gregory S. and Ward-Thompson, Derek 2016. Mapping magnetic fields in star forming regions with BLASTPol. Presented at: 227th Meeting of the American Astronomical Society, Kissimmee, FL, United States, 04-08 January 2016.

Full text not available from this repository.

Abstract

A key outstanding question in our understanding of star formation is whether magnetic fields provide support against the gravitational collapse of their parent molecular clouds and cores. Direct measurement of magnetic field strength is observationally challenging, however observations of polarized thermal emission from dust grains aligned with respect to the local cloud magnetic field can be used to map out the magnetic field orientation in molecular clouds. Statistical comparisons between these submillimeter polarization maps and three-dimensional numerical simulations of magnetized star-forming clouds provide a promising method for constraining magnetic field strength. We present early results from a BLASTPol study of the nearby giant molecular cloud (GMC) Vela C, using data collected during a 2012 Antarctic flight. This sensitive balloon-borne polarimeter observed Vela C for 57 hours, yielding the most detailed submillimeter polarization map ever made of a GMC forming high mass stars. We find that most of the structure in p can be modeled by a power-law dependence on two quantities: the hydrogen column density and the local dispersion in magnetic field orientation. Our power-law model for p(N,S) provides new constraints for models of magnetized star-forming clouds and an important first step in the interpretation of the BLASTPol 2012 data set.

Item Type:	Conference or Workshop Item (Paper)
Date Type:	Published Online
Status:	Unpublished
Schools:	Physics and Astronomy
Last Modified:	04 May 2023 13:30
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/156814

Actions (repository staff only)

Edit Item