Imaging the Molecular Outflows of the Prototypical ULIRG NGC 6240 with ALMA


Abstract in English

We present 0.97 $times$ 0.53 (470 pc $times$ 250 pc) resolution CO ($J$ = 2-1) observations toward the nearby luminous merging galaxy NGC 6240 with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array. We confirmed a strong CO concentration within the central 700 pc, which peaks between the double nuclei, surrounded by extended CO features along the optical dust lanes ($sim$11 kpc). We found that the CO emission around the central a few kpc has extremely broad velocity wings with full width at zero intensity $sim$ 2000 km s$^{-1}$, suggesting a possible signature of molecular outflow(s). In order to extract and visualize the high-velocity components in NGC 6240, we performed a multiple Gaussian fit to the CO datacube. The distribution of the broad CO components show four extremely large linewidth regions ($sim$1000 km s$^{-1}$) located 1-2 kpc away from both nuclei. Spatial coincidence of the large linewidth regions with H$alpha$, near-IR H$_2$, and X-ray suggests that the broad CO (2-1) components are associated with nuclear outflows launched from the double nuclei.

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