Filamentary mass accretion towards the high-mass protobinary system G11.92-0.61 MM2
Abstract
We present deep, sub-arcsecond (2000 AU) resolution ALMA 0.82 mm observations of the former high-mass prestellar core candidate G11.92-0.61 MM2, recently shown to be an 500 AU-separation protobinary. Our observations show that G11.92-0.61 MM2, located in the G11.92-0.61 protocluster, lies on a filamentary structure traced by 0.82 mm continuum and NH(4-3) emission. The NH(4-3) spectra are multi-peaked, indicative of multiple velocity components along the line of sight. To analyse the gas kinematics, we performed pixel-by-pixel Gaussian decomposition of the NH spectra using SCOUSEPY and hierarchical clustering of the extracted velocity components using ACORNS. Seventy velocity- and position-coherent clusters (called "trees") are identified in the NH-emitting gas, with the 8 largest trees accounting for >60% of the fitted velocity components. The primary tree, with 20% of the fitted velocity components, displays a roughly north-south velocity gradient along the filamentary structure traced by the 0.82 mm continuum. Analysing a 0.17 pc-long substructure, we interpret its velocity gradient of 10.5 km spc as tracing filamentary accretion towards MM2 and estimate a mass inflow rate of 1.8 to 1.2 M yr. Based on the recent detection of a bipolar molecular outflow associated with MM2, accretion onto the protobinary is ongoing, likely fed by the larger-scale filamentary accretion flows. If 50% of the filamentary inflow reaches the protostars, each member of the protobinary would attain a mass of 8 M within 10 yr, comparable to the combined timescale of the 70 m- and MIR-weak phases derived for ATLASGAL-TOP100 massive clumps using chemical clocks.
Cite
@article{arxiv.2407.19552,
title = {Filamentary mass accretion towards the high-mass protobinary system G11.92-0.61 MM2},
author = {S. Zhang and C. J. Cyganowski and J. D. Henshaw and C. L. Brogan and T. R. Hunter and R. Friesen and I. A. Bonnell and S. Viti},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2407.19552},
year = {2024}
}
Comments
21 pages, 15 figures, 2 tables, Accepted for publication in MNRAS