4.7 Article

Chemical differentiation in regions of high-mass star formation - II. Molecular multiline and dust continuum studies of selected objects

Journal

MONTHLY NOTICES OF THE ROYAL ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY
Volume 395, Issue 4, Pages 2234-2247

Publisher

OXFORD UNIV PRESS
DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-2966.2009.14687.x

Keywords

astrochemistry; stars: formation; ISM: clouds; ISM: molecules; radio lines: ISM

Funding

  1. Russian Foundation for Basic Research [03-02-16307, 06-02-16317]
  2. Russian Academy of Science
  3. INTAS [99-1667]
  4. Science and Technology Facilities Council [ST/F002092/1] Funding Source: researchfish
  5. STFC [ST/F002092/1] Funding Source: UKRI

Ask authors/readers for more resources

The aim of this study is to investigate systematic chemical differentiation of molecules in regions of high-mass star formation (HMSF). We observed five prominent sites of HMSF in HCN, HNC, HCO+, their isotopes, (CO)-O-18, (CS)-S-34 and some other molecular lines, for some sources both at 3 and 1.3 mm and in continuum at 1.3 mm. Taking into account earlier obtained data for N2H+, we derive molecular abundances and physical parameters of the sources (mass, density, ionization fraction, etc.). The kinetic temperature is estimated from CH3C2H observations. Then, we analyse correlations between molecular abundances and physical parameters and discuss chemical models applicable to these species. The typical physical parameters for the sources in our sample are the following: kinetic temperature in the range similar to 30-50 K( it is systematically higher than that obtained from ammonia observations and is rather close to dust temperature), masses from tens to hundreds solar masses, gas densities similar to 10(5) cm(-3) and ionization fraction similar to 10(-7). Inmost cases, the ionization fraction slightly (a few times) increases towards the embedded young stellar objects (YSOs). The observed clumps are close to gravitational equilibrium. There are systematic differences in distributions of various molecules. The abundances of CO, CS and HCN are more or less constant. There is no sign of CO and/or CS depletion as in cold cores. At the same time, the abundances of HCO+, HNC and especially N2H+ strongly vary in these objects. They anticorrelate with the ionization fraction and as a result decrease towards the embedded YSOs. For N2H+ this can be explained by dissociative recombination to be the dominant destroying process. N2H+, HCO+ and HNC are valuable indicators of massive protostars.

Authors

I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.

Reviews

Primary Rating

4.7
Not enough ratings

Secondary Ratings

Novelty
-
Significance
-
Scientific rigor
-
Rate this paper

Recommended

No Data Available
No Data Available