Surveying the Protostellar Population Powering Extended Green Objects (EGOs) with the VLA
Abstract
We present 3.6 cm and 1.3 cm (C- and K-band) JVLA observations of 10 nascent massive protoclusters in the Milky Way. These protoclusters are typical young, massive objects with total FIR luminosities ranging from 1,000 to 40,000 Lsun, and exist in a specific evolutionary state that is a) prior to the onset of significant ionization feedback and b) in which active outflows dominate their infrared appearance. These VLA observations cover known 6.7 GHz Class II CH3OH and 22 GHz H2O masers in these objects, as well as 3.6 cm and 1.3 cm continuum observations with sensitivities of tens of micro-Janskys at an angular resolution of ~0.4-arcseconds. These observations address two key areas of massive protocluster research: 1) Well-sampled SEDs for the individual protostars in these sources will allow us to disentangle the various types of centimeter-wavelength continuum emission (dust, free-free, synchrotron, etc.) that may be present for each protostar, and the high angular resolution enables us to further refine the specific physical emission mechanisms (e.g. gravitationally-trapped HC HII region, ionized jet, stellar wind, etc.) in each MYSO. 2) These SEDs will also allow us to examine the demographics (evolutionary stage, mass, clustering, mass segregation if any) of each protocluster. In addition to characterizing the unique properties of each individual protocluster, we will also be able to compare our data to the predictions of current theories of massive star formation.
- Publication:
-
American Astronomical Society Meeting Abstracts #233
- Pub Date:
- January 2019
- Bibcode:
- 2019AAS...23336117T