High-mass star formation possibly triggered by cloud-cloud collision in the HII region RCW 34

Abstract

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.

18 pages, 10 figures, 2 tables, accepted for Publications of the Astronomical Society of Japan (PASJ)

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Cited by in corpus (3)

• FOREST Unbiased Galactic plane Imaging survey with the Nobeyama 45-m telescope (FUGIN) : Molecular clouds toward W33 ; possible evidence for a cloud-cloud collision triggering O star formation
• Formation of the young compact cluster GM 24 triggered by a cloud-cloud collision
• Unveiling molecular clouds toward bipolar HII region G8.14+0.23