Spitzer-MIPS survey of the young stellar content in the Vela Molecular Cloud-D

TL;DR

This study presents an unbiased Spitzer-MIPS survey of the Vela Molecular Cloud-D, revealing a rich population of protostars, including Class I and 0 objects, and correlating their distribution with millimeter emission data.

Contribution

It provides the first comprehensive infrared survey of Vela Molecular Cloud-D, identifying protostellar populations and their spatial correlation with gas and dust structures.

Findings

Detected 849 sources at 24μm, 52 at 70μm.

Found an excess of Class I protostars compared to other regions.

Identified embedded objects in starless cores and potential Class 0 objects.

Abstract

A new, unbiased Spitzer-MIPS imaging survey (~1.8 square degs) of the young stellar content of the Vela Molecular Cloud-D is presented. The survey is complete down to 5mJy and 250mJy at 24micron (mu) and 70mu, respectively. 849 sources are detected at 24mu and 52 of them also have a 70mu counterpart. The VMR-D region is one that we have already partially mapped in dust and gas millimeter emission, and we discuss the correlation between the Spitzer compact sources and the mm contours. About half of the 24mu sources are located inside the region delimited by the 12CO(1-0) contours (corresponding to only one third of the full area mapped with MIPS) with a consequent density increase of about 100% of the 24mu sources [four times for 70mu ones] moving from outside to inside the CO contours. About 400 sources have a 2MASS counterpart. So we have constructed a Ks vs. Ks-[24] diagram and identified the protostellar population. We find an excess of Class I sources in VMR-D in comparison with other star forming regions. This result is reasonably biased by the sensitivity limits, or, alternatively, may reflect a very short lifetime (<=10^6yr) of the protostellar content in this cloud. The MIPS images have identified embedded cool objects in most of the previously identified starless cores; in addition, there are 6 very young, possibly Class 0 objects identified. Finally we report finding of the driving sources for a set of five out of six very compact protostellar jets previously discovered in near-infrared images.