The resolved magnetic fields of the quiescent cloud GRSMC 45.60+0.30

Marchwinski et al. (2012) mapped the magnetic field strength across the quiescent cloud GRSMC 45.60+0.30 (shown in Figure 1 subtending 40x10 pc at a distance of 1.88 kpc) with the Chandrasekhar-Fermi method CF; Chandrasekhar & Fermi 1953) using near-infrared starlight polarimetry from the Galactic Plane Infrared Polarization Survey (Clemens et al. 2012a, b) and gas properties from the Galactic Ring Survey (Jackson et al. 2006). The large-scale magnetic field is oriented parallel to the gas-traced `spine' of the cloud. Seven `magnetic cores' with high magnetic field strength were identified and are coincident with peaks in the gas column density. Calculation of the mass-to-flux ratio (Crutcher 1999) shows that these cores are exclusively magnetically subcritical and that magnetostatic pressure can support them against gravitational collapse.