An Expanding Neutral Hydrogen Supershell Evacuated by Multiple Supernovae in M101

TL;DR

This paper reports the discovery and analysis of an expanding neutral hydrogen supershell in galaxy M101, driven by multiple supernovae, providing empirical evidence for supershell formation theories.

Contribution

It presents the first detailed measurement of an extragalactic HI supershell's expansion velocity and size, confirming its origin from a young OB association and testing supershell formation models.

Findings

Supershell size: 500 pc

Expansion velocity: 20 km/s

UV flux consistent with a 15 Myr, 10^5 Solar Mass cluster

Abstract

Several neutral hydrogen (HI) cavities have been detected in the Milky Way and other nearby star forming galaxies. It has been suggested that at least a fraction of them may be expanding supershells driven by the combined mechanical feedback from multiple supernovae occurring in an OB association. Yet most extragalactic HI holes have neither a demonstrated expansion velocity, nor an identified OB association inside them. In this work, we report on the discovery of an unbroken expanding HI supershell in the nearby spiral galaxy M101, with an UV emitting OB association inside it. We measure its size (500 pc) and expansion velocity (20 km/s) by identifying both its approaching and receding components in the position-velocity space, using 21 cm emission spectroscopy. This provides us with an ideal system to test the theory of supershells driven by the mechanical feedback from multiple supernovae. The UV emission of the cluster inside the supershell is compared with simulated spectral energy distribution of synthetic clusters of the appropriate age (~15 Myr). The observed UV flux is found to be consistent with an association of the appropriate mass (~10^5 Solar Mass) and age required by the energy budget of the supershell. Properties of this supershell and another previously reported in the same galaxy are used to infer its neutral hydrogen scale height and mean neutral hydrogen density in the disk. The presence of another UV emitting stellar association in over-dense swept up gas is discussed in the context of propagating star formation.