Molecular Line Observations of Infrared Dark Clouds II: Physical Conditions

TL;DR

This study uses molecular line observations and LVG modeling to analyze the physical conditions of infrared dark clouds, revealing their densities, masses, and star-forming potential, with implications for cluster formation.

Contribution

It provides new measurements of H2 densities, CS column densities, and gravitational stability parameters for IRDCs, expanding understanding of their diversity and star formation capabilities.

Findings

Average H2 density of 1.14 x 10^6 cm^-3

Most cores are gravitationally unstable and likely to form protoclusters

Diversity in star-forming properties extends the known range of IRDCs.

Abstract

Using a source selection biased towards high mass star forming regions, we used a Large Velocity Gradient (LVG) code to calculate the H2 densities and CS column densities for a sample of Midcourse Space Experiment (MSX) 8 micron infrared dark cores. Our average H2 density and CS column density were 1.14 x 10e6 cm-3 and 1.21 x 10e13 cm-2 respectively. In addition, we have calculated the Jeans mass and Virial mass for each core to get a better understanding of their gravitational stability. We found that core masses calculated from observations of N2H+ J = 1-0 and C18O J = 1-0 by Ragan et al. 2006 (Paper 1) were sufficient for collapse, though most regions are likely to form protoclusters. We have explored the star-forming properties of the molecular gas within our sample and find some diversity which extends the range of infrared dark clouds from very the massive clouds that will create large clusters, to clouds that are similar to some of our local counterparts (e.g. Serpens, Ophiuchus).