The Formation of Star and Planetary Systems: New Results from Spitzer
P. Manoj
备注：
15 pages, 6 figures, to appear in the ASP conference proceedings of the "Frank N. Bash Symposium 2009: New Horizons in Astronomy", eds. L. Stanford, L. Hao, Y. Mao, J. Green
Protoplanetary disks are thought to be the birth places of planetary systems. The formation and the subsequent evolution of protoplanetary disks are regulated by the star formation process, which begins with the collapse of a cloud core to form a central protostar surrounded by a disk and an overlying envelope. In the protostellar phase, most of the envelope material is transferred onto the star through the disk during episodic, high accretion events. The initial conditions for planet formation in protoplanetary disks are likely set by the details of these processes. In this contribution, I will review some of the new observational results from Spitzer on protostellar evolution and the structure and evolution of protoplanetary disks surrounding young stars in the nearby star forming regions. The implications of these results for planet formation and eventual disk dissipation are discussed.
We present Spitzer Space Telescope archival mid-infrared (mid-IR) spectroscopy of a sample of eleven planetary nebulae (PNe). The observations, acquired with the Spitzer Infrared Spectrograph (IRS), cover the spectral range 5.2-14.5 μm that includes the H2 0-0 S(2) to S(7) rotational emission lines. This wavelength coverage has allowed us to derive the Boltzmann distribution and calculate the H2 rotational excitation temperature (Tex). The derived excitation temperatures have consistent values ~900+/-70 K for different sources despite their different structural components. We also report the d…
The initial conditions of stellar protocluster formation. I. A catalogue of Spitzer dark clouds
大多数恒星形成于星团中。因此，全面了解恒星形成需要了解团簇形成的初始条件。我们的研究目标是阐明红外暗云（IRDC）的物理性质及其在星团形成中的作用。这篇文章是专门研究IRDC的系列文章的第一篇，描述了为建立银河系斯皮策IRDC的完整目录而开发的技术。我们分析了斯皮策GLIMPSE和MIPSGAL的数据，以确定银河经度和纬度10度< |l| <65度和|b| <1deg. From the 8micron observations we have constructed opacity maps and used a newly developed extraction algorithm to identify structures above a column density of N_{H2} >1 × 10 ^{22} cm^{-2}区域内的IRDC的完整样本。24微米的数据然后被用来表征每个提取的云的恒星形成活动。总共提取了11303个云。与现有的基于MSX的IRDC目录相比，这些斯皮策星云中有80%以前是未知的。该算法还提取这些云内的~ 20000至50000片段，这取决于所使用的检测阈值。MIPSGAL的数据表明，这些IRDC中有20%到68%显示出24微米的点状关联。这个新的数据库为未来的研究提供了重要的资源，旨在了解银河系恒星形成的初始条件。
When did galaxies start forming stars? What is the role of distant galaxies in galaxy formation models and the epoch of reionization? What are the conditions in typical star-forming galaxies at redshifts >~4? Why is galaxy evolution dependent on environment? The Spitzer Space Telescope has been a crucial tool for addressing these questions. Accurate knowledge of stellar masses, ages and star formation rates requires measuring rest-frame optical (and ultraviolet) light, which only Spitzer can probe at high redshifts for a sufficiently large sample of typical galaxies. Many of these science goal…
Understanding the mechanism of O star formation is one of the most important issues in current astrophysics. It is also an issue of keen interest how O stars affect their surroundings and trigger secondary star formation. An H\,\emissiontype{II} region RCW79 is one of the typical Spitzer bubbles alongside of RCW120. New observations of CO $J=$ 1--0 emission with Mopra and NANTEN2 revealed that molecular clouds are associated with RCW79 in four velocity components over a velocity range of 20 km s$^{-1}$. We hypothesize that two of the clouds collided with each other and the collision triggered …
Star Formation and the Interstellar Medium In Nearby Tidal Streams (SAINTS): Spitzer Mid-infrared Spectroscopy and Imaging of Intergalactic Star-forming Objects
Galactic plane surveys of pristine molecular clouds are key for establishing a Galactic-scale view of the earliest stages of star formation. For this reason Peretto & Fuller (2009) built an unbiased sample of IRDCs in the 10 deg < |l| < 65 deg, |b|<1 deg region of the Galactic plane using Spitzer 8micron extinction. However, in absorption studies, intrinsic fluctuations in the mid-infrared background can be mis-interpreted as foreground clouds. The main goal of the study presented here is to disentangle real clouds in the Spitzer Dark Cloud (SDC) catalogue from artefacts due to fluctuations in…
There is a lack of large samples of spectroscopically confirmed clusters and protoclusters at high redshifts, $z>$1.5. Discovering and characterizing distant (proto-)clusters is important for yielding insights into the formation of large-scale structure and on the physical processes responsible for regulating star-formation in galaxies in dense environments. The Spitzer Planck Herschel Infrared Cluster (SPHerIC) survey was initiated to identify these characteristically faint and dust-reddened sources during the epoch of their early assembly. We present Spitzer IRAC observations of 82 galaxy (p…
We present the discovery of WISEA J083011.95+283716.0, the first Y dwarf candidate identified through the Backyard Worlds: Planet 9 citizen science project. We identified this object as a red, fast-moving source with a faint $W2$ detection in multi-epoch \textit{AllWISE} and unWISE images. We have characterized this object with Spitzer Space Telescope and \textit{Hubble Space Telescope} follow-up imaging. With mid-infrared detections in \textit{Spitzer}'s \emph{ch1} and \emph{ch2} bands and flux upper limits in Hubble Space Telescope $F105W$ and $F125W$ filters, we find that this object is bot…
Star formation is spatially clustered across a range of environments, from dense stellar clusters to unbound associations. As a result, radiative or dynamical interactions with neighbouring stars disrupt (proto)planetary systems and limit their radii, leaving a lasting impact on their potential habitability. In the solar neighbourhood, we find that the vast majority of stars form in unbound associations, such that the interaction of (proto)planetary systems with neighbouring stars is limited to the densest sub-regions. However, the fraction of star formation occurring in compact clusters was c…
Herein, we present the 12CO (J=1-0) and 13CO (J=1-0) emission line observations via the FOREST Unbiased Galactic plane Imaging survey with the Nobeyama 45-m telescope (FUGIN) toward a Spitzer bubble N4. We observed clouds of three discrete velocities: 16, 19, and 25 km/s. Their masses were 0.1x10^4 Msun, 0.3x10^4 Msun, and 1.4x10^4 Msun, respectively. The distribution of the 25-km/s cloud likely traces the ring-like structure observed at mid-infrared wavelength. We could not find clear expanding motion of the molecular gas in N4. On the contrary, we found a bridge feature and a complementary d…
