The extinction map of the OMC-1 molecular cloud behind the Orion Nebula

TL;DR

This study creates detailed extinction maps of the OMC-1 and Orion Nebula, revealing their structure, variable extinction, and filamentary features, enhancing understanding of star formation regions.

Contribution

It introduces a new method to derive high-resolution extinction maps of OMC-1 and Orion Nebula using near-infrared data and star counts, distinguishing cluster members from contaminants.

Findings

Extinction varies on arcminute scales, increasing towards the Trapezium.

OMC-1 shows higher extinction than the Orion Nebula, with values exceeding 30 magnitudes.

Both maps reveal filamentary structures consistent with star formation activity.

Abstract

Our main goal is to derive a new extinction map of the OMC-1, obtaining information about the structure of the OMC-1 and the Orion Nebula Cluster. The most recent near-infrared catalog of stars is used to study the distribution of reddening across a ~0.3 deg^2 area covering the Orion Nebula Cluster. On the basis of the observed (H,H-K_S) diagram, we establish a criterion for disentangling contaminants from bona-fide cluster members. For contaminant stars, interstellar reddenings are estimated by comparison with a synthetic galactic model. A statistical analysis is then performed to consistently account for local extinction, reddening and star-counts analysis. We derive the extinction map of the OMC-1 with angular resolution <5'. We also assemble a sample of candidate cluster members, for which we measure the extinction provided by the nebular environment. These extinction measurements are analyzed similarly to the contaminant sample, and an extinction map of the Orion Nebula is derived. The extinction provided by the OMC-1 is variable on spatial scales of a few arcminutes, while showing a general increase from the outskirts (A_V~6) to the direction of the Trapezium asterism (A_V>30). The Orion Nebula extinction map is more irregular and optically thinner, with A_V of the order of a few magnitudes. Both maps are consistent with the optical morphology, in particular the Dark Bay to the north-east of the Trapezium. Both maps also show the presence of a north-south high-density ridge, which confirms the filamentary structure of the Orion molecular complex inside which star formation is still taking place.