No Arabic abstract
We analyzed the NANTEN2 13CO (J=2-1 and 1-0) datasets in NGC 2024. We found that the cloud consists of two velocity components, whereas the cloud shows mostly single-peaked CO profiles. The two components are physically connected to the HII region as evidenced by their close correlation with the dark lanes and the emission nebulosity. The two components show complementary distribution with a displacement of 0.4 pc. Such complementary distribution is typical to colliding clouds discovered in regions of high-mass star formation. We hypothesize that cloud-cloud collision between the two components triggered the formation of the late O stars and early B stars localized within 0.3 pc of the cloud peak. The collision timescale is estimated to be ~ 10^5 yrs from a ratio of the displacement and the relative velocity 3-4 km s-1 corrected for probable projection. The high column density of the colliding cloud 1023 cm-2 is similar to those in the other massive star clusters in RCW 38, Westerlund 2, NGC 3603, and M42, which are likely formed under trigger by cloud-cloud collision. The present results provide an additional piece of evidence favorable to high-mass star formation by a major cloud-cloud collision in Orion.
We performed new comprehensive $^{13}$CO($J$=2--1) observations toward NGC 2024, the most active star forming region in Orion B, with an angular resolution of $sim$100 obtained with NANTEN2. We found that the associated cloud consists of two independent velocity components. The components are physically connected to the H{sc ii} region as evidenced by their close correlation with the dark lanes and the emission nebulosity. The two components show complementary distribution with a displacement of $sim$0.6 pc. Such complementary distribution is typical to colliding clouds discovered in regions of high-mass star formation. We hypothesize that a cloud-cloud collision between the two components triggered the formation of the late O-type stars and early B stars localized within 0.3 pc of the cloud peak. The duration time of the collision is estimated to be 0.3 million years from a ratio of the displacement and the relative velocity $sim$3 km s$^{-1}$ corrected for probable projection. The high column density of the colliding cloud $sim$10$^{23}$ cm$^{-2}$ is similar to those in the other high-mass star clusters in RCW 38, Westerlund 2, NGC 3603, and M42, which are likely formed under trigger by cloud-cloud collision. The present results provide an additional piece of evidence favorable to high-mass star formation by a major cloud-cloud collision in Orion.
Using the NANTEN2 Observatory, we carried out a molecular line study of high-mass star forming regions with reflection nebulae, NGC 2068 and NGC 2071, in Orion in the 13CO(J=2-1) transition. The 13CO distribution shows that there are two velocity components at 9.0 and 10.5 km/s . The blue-shifted component is in the northeast associated with NGC 2071, whereas the red-shifted component is in the southwest associated with NGC 2068. The total intensity distribution of the two clouds shows a gap of ~1 pc, suggesting that they are detached at present. A detailed spatial comparison indicates that the two show complementary distributions. The blue-shifted component lies toward an intensity depression to the northwest of the red-shifted component, where we find that a displacement of 0.8 pc makes the two clouds fit well with each other. Furthermore, a new simulation of non-frontal collisions shows that observations from 60 degrees off the collisional axis agreed well with the velocity structure in this region. On the basis of these results, we hypothesize that the two components collided with each other at a projected relative velocity 3.0 km/s estimated to be 0.3 Myr for an assumed axis of the relative motion 60 degrees off the line of sight. We assume that the two most massive early B-type stars in the cloud, illuminating stars of the two reflection nebulae, were formed by collisional triggering at the interfaces between the two clouds. Given the other young high-mass star forming regions, namely, M42, M43, and NGC 2024 (Fukui et al. 2018b; Ohama et al. 2017a), it seems possible that collisional triggering has been independently working to form O-type and early B-type stars in Orion in the last Myr over a projected distance of ~80 pc.
We report a possibility that the high-mass star located in the HII region RCW 34 was formed by a triggering induced by a collision of molecular clouds. Molecular gas distributions of the $^{12}$CO and $^{13}$CO $J=$2-1, and $^{12}$CO $J=$3-2 lines toward RCW 34 were measured by using the NANTEN2 and ASTE telescopes. We found two clouds with the velocity ranges of 0-10 km s$^{-1}$ and 10-14 km s$^{-1}$. Whereas the former cloud as massive as ~2.7 x 10$^{4}$ Msun has a morphology similar to the ring-like structure observed in the infrared wavelengths, the latter cloud with the mass of ~10$^{3}$ Msun, which has not been recognized by previous observations, distributes just likely to cover the bubble enclosed by the other cloud. The high-mass star with the spectral types of O8.5V is located near the boundary of the two clouds. The line intensity ratio of $^{12}$CO $J=$3-2 / $J=$2-1 yields high values (~1.5) in the neighborhood of the high-mass star, suggesting that these clouds are associated with the massive star. We also confirmed that the obtained position-velocity diagram shows a similar distribution with that derived by a numerical simulation of the supersonic collision of two clouds. Using the relative velocity between the two clouds (~5 km s$^{-1}$), the collisional time scale is estimated to be $sim$0.2 Myr with the assumption of the distance of 2.5 kpc. These results suggest that the high-mass star in RCW 34 was formed rapidly within a time scale of ~0.2 Myr via a triggering of cloud-cloud collision.
A collision between two molecular clouds is one possible candidate for high-mass star formation. The HII region RCW 36, located in the Vela molecular ridge, contains a young star cluster with two O-type stars. We present new CO observations of RCW 36 with NANTEN2, Mopra, and ASTE using $^{12}$CO($J$ = 1-0, 2-1, 3-2) and $^{13}$CO($J$ = 2-1) line emissions. We have discovered two molecular clouds lying at the velocities $V_mathrm{LSR} sim$5.5 and 9 km s$^{-1}$. Both clouds are likely to be physically associated with the star cluster, as verified by the good spatial correspondence among the two clouds, infrared filaments, and the star cluster. We also found a high intensity ratio of $sim$0.6-1.2 for CO $J$ = 3-2 / 1-0 toward both clouds, indicating that the gas temperature has been increased due to heating by the O-type stars. We propose that the O-type stars in RCW 36 were formed by a collision between the two clouds, with a relative velocity separation of 5 km s$^{-1}$. The complementary spatial distributions and the velocity separation of the two clouds are in good agreement with observational signatures expected for O-type star formation triggered by a cloud-cloud collision. We also found a displacement between the complementary spatial distributions of the two clouds, which we estimate to be 0.3 pc assuming the collision angle to be 45$^{circ}$ relative to the line-of-sight. We estimate the collision timescale to be $sim$10$^5$ yr. It is probable that the cluster age by Ellerbroek et al. (2013b) is dominated by the low-mass members which were not formed under the triggering by cloud-cloud collision, and that the O-type stars in the center of the cluster are explained by the collisional triggering independently from the low-mass star formation.
We report on a study of the high-mass star formation in the the HII region W28A2 by investigating the molecular clouds extended over ~5-10 pc from the exciting stars using the 12CO and 13CO (J=1-0) and 12CO (J=2-1) data taken by the NANTEN2 and Mopra observations. These molecular clouds consist of three velocity components with the CO intensity peaks at V_LSR ~ -4 km s$^{-1}$, 9 km s$^{-1}$ and 16 km s$^{-1}$. The highest CO intensity is detected at V_LSR ~ 9 km s$^{-1}$, where the high-mass stars with the spectral types of O6.5-B0.5 are embedded. We found bridging features connecting these clouds toward the directions of the exciting sources. Comparisons of the gas distributions with the radio continuum emission and 8 um infrared emission show spatial coincidence/anti-coincidence, suggesting physical associations between the gas and the exciting sources. The 12CO J=2-1 to 1-0 intensity ratio shows a high value (> 0.8) toward the exciting sources for the -4 km s$^{-1}$ and +9 km s$^{-1}$ clouds, possibly due to heating by the high-mass stars, whereas the intensity ratio at the CO intensity peak (V_LSR ~ 9 km s$^{-1}$) lowers down to ~0.6, suggesting self absorption by the dense gas in the near side of the +9 km s$^{-1}$ cloud. We found partly complementary gas distributions between the -4 km s$^{-1}$ and +9 km s$^{-1}$ clouds, and the -4 km s$^{-1}$ and +16 km s$^{-1}$ clouds. The exciting sources are located toward the overlapping region in the -4 km s$^{-1}$ and +9 km s$^{-1}$ clouds. Similar gas properties are found in the Galactic massive star clusters, RCW 38 and NGC 6334, where an early stage of cloud collision to trigger the star formation is suggested. Based on these results, we discuss a possibility of the formation of high-mass stars in the W28A2 region triggered by the cloud-cloud collision.