Dense Molecular Clouds in the Crab Supernova Remnant
Abstract
Molecular emission was imaged with ALMA from numerous components near and within bright H2-emitting knots and absorbing dust globules in the Crab Nebula. These observations provide a critical test of how energetic photons and particles produced in a young supernova remnant interact with gas, cleanly differentiating between competing models. The four fields targeted show contrasting properties but within them, seventeen distinct molecular clouds are identified with CO emission; a few also show emission from HCO+, SiO and/or SO. These observations are compared with Cloudy models of these knots. It has been suggested that the Crab filaments present an exotic environment in which H2 emission comes from a mostly-neutral zone probably heated by cosmic rays produced in the supernova surrounding a cool core of molecular gas. Our model is consistent with the observed CO J=3-2 line strength. These molecular line emitting knots in the Crab present a novel phase of the ISM representative of many important astrophysical environments.
Cite
@article{arxiv.2111.06033,
title = {Dense Molecular Clouds in the Crab Supernova Remnant},
author = {Alwyn Wootten and Rory O. Bentley and J. Baldwin and F. Combes and A. C. Fabian and G. J. Ferland and E. Loh and P. Salome and C. N. Shingledecker and A. Castro-Carrizo},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2111.06033},
year = {2022}
}
Comments
ApJ in press, comments welcome