2005/06/30 by Ryo Kandori, Yasushi Nakajima, Motohide Tamura +11 · 2 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Astronomy and Astrophysical Research #Astrophysics and Star Formation Studies #Galaxies: Formation, Evolution, Phenomena #astro-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1086/444619
published as Astron.J.130:2166-2184,2005 · Accepted for publication in the Astronomical Journal. 39 pages in preprint format, including 10 figures. The version with higher resolution figures can be obtained at the following site (http://alma.mtk.nao.ac.jp/~kandori/preprint/)
arxiv created 2005/08/03 · openalex publication_date 2005/10/26 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/31
On the basis of near-infrared imaging observations, we derived the visual extinction ( A V ) distribution toward 10 Bok globules through measurements of both the color excess ( E H - K ) and the stellar density at J , H , and K s (star count). Radial column density profiles for each globule were analyzed with the Bonnor-Ebert sphere model. Using the data of our 10 globules and four globules in the literature, we investigated the stability of globules on the basis of ξ max , which characterizes the Bonnor-Ebert sphere, as well as the stability of the equilibrium state against gravitational collapse. We found that more than half the starless globules are located near the critical state (ξ max = 6.5 ± 2). Thus, we suggest that a nearly critical Bonnor-Ebert sphere characterizes the typical density structure of starless globules. The remaining starless globules show clearly unstable states (ξ max > 10). Since unstable equilibrium states are not long maintained, we expect that these globules are on the way to gravitational collapse or that they are stabilized by nonthermal support. It was also found that all the star-forming globules show unstable solutions of ξ max > 10, which is consistent with the fact that they have started gravitational collapse. We investigated the evolution of a collapsing gas sphere whose initial condition is a nearly critical Bonnor-Ebert sphere. We found that the column density profiles of the collapsing sphere mimic those of the static Bonnor-Ebert spheres in unstable equilibrium. The collapsing gas sphere resembles marginally unstable Bonnor-Ebert spheres for a long time. We found that the frequency distribution of ξ max for the observed starless globules is consistent with that from model calculations of the collapsing sphere. In addition to the near-infrared observations, we carried out radio molecular line observations (C 18 O and N 2 H + ) toward the same 10 globules. We confirmed that most of the globules are dominated by thermal support. The line width of each globule was used to estimate the cloud temperature including the contribution from turbulence, with which we estimated the distance to the globules from the Bonnor-Ebert model fitting.