Magnetic flux density from the relative circular motion of stars and partially ionized gas in the Galaxy mid-plane vicinity

Abstract

Observations suggest a slower stellar rotation relative to gas rotation in the outer part of the Milky Way Galaxy. This difference could be attributed to an interaction with the interstellar magnetic field. In a simple model, fields of order 10 micro Gauss are then required, consistently with the observed values. This coincidence suggests a tool for estimating magnetic fields in spiral galaxies. A North-South asymmetry in the rotation of gas in the Galaxy could be of magnetic origin too.

10 pages, 10 figures

References in corpus (5)

• What is Driving the HI Velocity Dispersion?
• The Vertical Structure of the Outer Milky Way HI Disk
• Dark matter in the Milky Way, II. the HI gas distribution as a tracer of the gravitational potential
• Classical Cepheids in the Galactic outer ring R1R2'
• Do magnetic fields influence gas rotation in galaxies?