A milestone toward understanding PDR properties in the extreme environment of LMC-30Dor

TL;DR

This study investigates the impact of massive star formation on low metallicity interstellar medium in 30 Doradus, using Herschel observations and PDR modeling to understand gas properties and structure in an extreme galactic environment.

Contribution

It provides detailed spatially resolved analysis of gas heating, cooling, and structure in 30 Doradus, combining multi-wavelength data with PDR modeling to characterize the ISM in a low-metallicity, high-radiation environment.

Findings

Derived pressure range of ~10^5 to 1.7x10^6 cm^{-3} K.

Estimated radiation field G_UV between 10^2 and 2.5x10^4.

Determined PDR cloud sizes of 0.2 to 3 parsecs.

Abstract

More complete knowledge of galaxy evolution requires understanding the process of star formation and interaction between the interstellar radiation field and the interstellar medium in galactic environments traversing a wide range of physical parameter space. Here we focus on the impact of massive star formation on the surrounding low metallicity ISM in 30 Doradus in the Large Magellanic Cloud. A low metal abundance, as is the case of some galaxies of the early universe, results in less ultra-violet shielding for the formation of the molecular gas necessary for star formation to proceed. The half-solar metallicity gas in this region is strongly irradiated by the super star cluster R136, making it an ideal laboratory to study the structure of the ISM in an extreme environment. Our spatially resolved study investigates the gas heating and cooling mechanisms, particularly in the photo-dissociation regions where the chemistry and thermal balance are regulated by far-ultraviolet photons (6 eV< h\nu <13.6 eV). We present Herschel observations of far-infrared fine-structure lines obtained with PACS and SPIRE/FTS. We have combined atomic fine-structure lines from Herschel and Spitzer observations with ground-based CO data to provide diagnostics on the properties and the structure of the gas by modeling it with the Meudon PDR code. We derive the spatial distribution of the radiation field, the pressure, the size, and the filling factor of the photodissociated gas and molecular clouds. We find a range of pressure of ~ 10^5 - 1.7x10^6 cm^{-3} K and a range of incident radiation field G_UV ~ 10^2 - 2.5x10^4 through PDR modeling. Assuming a plane-parallel geometry and a uniform medium, we find a total extinction of 1-3 mag , which correspond to a PDR cloud size of 0.2 to 3pc, with small CO depth scale of 0.06 to 0.5pc. We also determine the three dimensional structure of the gas. (Abridged)