Related papers: Alignment of Dust in Molecular Clouds
Collisions of gas particles with a drifting grain give rise to a mechanical torque on the grain. Recent work by Lazarian & Hoang showed that mechanical torques might play a significant role in aligning helical grains along the interstellar…
Polarized emission from interstellar dust grains is commonly used to infer information about the underlying magnetic field from the diffuse interstellar medium to molecular cloud cores. Therefore, the ability to accurately determine…
A quantitative analysis of grain alignment in the filamentary dark cloud L1755 in Ophiuchus is presented. We show, that the observed decrease of the polarization to extinction ratio for the inner parts of this quiescent dark cloud can be…
We present synthetic dust polarisation maps of 3D magneto-hydrodynamical simulations of molecular clouds before the onset of stellar feedback. The clouds are modelled within the SILCC-Zoom project and are embedded in their galactic…
The polarization of starlight and thermal dust emission from aligned non-spherical grains provides a powerful tool for tracing magnetic field morphologies and strengths in diffuse interstellar medium to star-forming regions, and…
High angular resolution observations of Class 0 protostars have produced detailed maps of the polarized dust emission in the envelopes of these young embedded objects. Interestingly, the improved sensitivity brought by ALMA has revealed…
Polarimetry in the far-infrared and submillimeter has been valuable in tracing magnetic fields in bright Galactic Clouds. We discuss the techniques we have developed and trends we have found in polarization vs column density, and vs…
Thermal dust polarization is a powerful tool to probe magnetic fields ($\textbf{B}$) and grain properties. However, a systematic study of the dependence of dust polarization on grain properties in protostellar environments is not yet…
Magnetic fields (B-fields) in galaxies have recently been traced using far-infrared and sub-mm polarimetric observations with SOFIA, JCMT, and ALMA. The main assumption is that dust grains are magnetically aligned with the local B-field in…
Irregular dust grains are subject to radiative torques when irradiated by interstellar starlight. It is shown how these radiative torques may be calculated using the discrete dipole approximation. Calculations are carried out for one…
We show that grains can be efficiently aligned by interacting with a subsonic gaseous flow. The alignment arises from grains having irregularities that scatter atoms with different efficiency in the right and left directions. The grains…
Diffuse striations in molecular clouds are preferentially aligned with local magnetic fields whereas dense filaments tend to be perpendicular to them. When and why this transition occurs remain uncertain. To explore the physics behind this…
The configuration and evolution of the magnetic field in star-forming cores are investigated in order to directly compare simulations and observations. We prepare four different initial clouds having different magnetic field strengths and…
We study the alignment of irregular dust grains by mechanical torques due to the drift of grains through the ambient gas. We first calculate mechanical torques (MATs) resulting from specular reflection of gas atoms for seven irregular…
Aims. It is quintessential for the analysis of the observed dust polarization signal to understand the rotational dynamics of interstellar dust grains. Additionally, high rotation velocities may rotationally disrupt the grains, which…
We investigate the combined effect of solar wind, Poynting-Robertson drag, and the frozen-in interplanetary magnetic field on the motion of charged dust grains in our solar system. For this reason we derive a secular theory of motion by the…
Nanometer- and micrometer-sized solid particles play an important role in the evolutionary cycle of stars and interstellar matter. The optical properties of cosmic grains determine the interaction of the radiation field with the solids,…
Context. Planck observations demonstrated that the grain alignment efficiency is almost constant in the diffuse ISM. Aims. We test if the Radiative Torque (RAT) theory is compatible with observational constraints on grain alignment.…
Polarized extinction and emission from dust in the interstellar medium (ISM) are hard to interpret, as they have a complex dependence on dust optical properties, grain alignment and magnetic field orientation. This is particularly true in…
There is a long-standing discussion in the astrophysical/astrochemical community as to the structure and morphology of dust grains in various astrophysical environments (e.g., interstellar clouds, protostellar envelopes, protoplanetary and…