The Properties of Massive, Dense, Clumps: Mapping Surveys of HCN and CS

TL;DR

This study maps over 50 massive dense clumps using multiple dense gas tracers, revealing relationships between line emission, physical properties, and star formation indicators, and comparing these to galaxy-scale observations.

Contribution

It provides new detailed mappings of dense gas tracers in massive clumps and compares their properties with galaxy-scale star formation relations.

Findings

Higher effective density tracers trace more compact inner regions.

Inverse linewidth-size relation observed with different tracers.

Linear correlation between infrared luminosity and dense gas line luminosity.

Abstract

We have mapped over 50 massive, dense clumps with four dense gas tracers: HCN J=1-0 and 3-2; and CS J=2-1 and 7-6 transitions. Spectral lines of optically thin H^{13}CN 3-2 and C^{34}S 5-4 were also obtained towards the map centers. These maps usually demonstrate single well-peaked distributions at our resolution, even with higher J transitions. The size, virial mass, surface density, and mean volume density within a well-defined angular size (FWHM) were calculated from the contour maps for each transition. We found that transitions with higher effective density usually trace the more compact, inner part of the clumps but have larger linewidths, leading to an inverse linewidth-size relation using different tracers. The mean surface densities are 0.29, 0.33, 0.78, 1.09 g cm^{-2} within FWHM contours of CS 2-1, HCN 1-0, HCN 3-2 and CS 7-6, respectively. We find no correlation of L_{IR} with surface density and a possible inverse correlation with mean volume density, contrary to some theoretical expectations. We see no evidence in the data for the relation between L'_{mol} and mean density posited by modelers. The correlation between L'_{mol} and the virial mass is roughly linear for each dense gas tracer. A nearly linear correlation was found between the infrared luminosity and the line luminosity of all dense gas tracers for these massive, dense clumps, with a lower cutoff in luminosity at L_{IR}=10^{4.5} Lsun. The L_{IR}-L'_{HCN1-0} correlation agrees well with the one found in galaxies. These correlations indicate a constant star formation rate per unit mass from the scale of dense clumps to that of distant galaxies when the mass is measured for dense gas. These results support the suggestion that starburst galaxies may be understood as having a large fraction of gas in dense clumps.