paper

On the magnetic field through the Upper Centaurs-Lupus Super bubble, in the vicinity of the Southern Coalsack

arXiv:1012.3230 · doi:10.1088/0004-637X/729/1/38

Abstract

The Southern Coalsack is located in the interior of the Upper Centaurus-Lupus (UCL) super bubble and shows many traits that point to a much more energetic environment than might be expected from a dark, starless molecular cloud. A hot, X-ray emitting, envelope surrounds the cloud, it has a very strong internal magnetic field and its darkest core seems to be on astronomical time scales "just about" to start forming stars. In order to probe the magnetic environment of the cloud and to compare with the optical/near infrared polarimetry-based field estimates for the cloud, we have acquired Faraday Rotation measurements towards the pulsar PSR J12106550, probing the magnetic field in the vicinity of the cloud, and a comparison target, PSR J14355954, at a similar line of sight distance but several degrees from the cloud. Both lines of sight hence primarily probe the UCL super bubble. The earlier estimates of the magnetic field inside the Coalsack, using the Chandrasekhar-Fermi method on optical and near-infrared polarimetry, yield B = 64--93 G. However, even though PSR J12106550 is located only 30 arc minutes from the (CO) edge of the cloud, the measured field strength is only B = 1.10.2 G. While thus yielding a very high field contrast to the cloud we argue that this might be understood as due to the effects on the cloud by the super bubble.

8 pages, 6 figures, Accepted for publication in ApJ

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