Emission-Line Datacubes of the HH 32 Stellar Jet

TL;DR

This study presents high-resolution emission-line datacubes of the HH 32 stellar jet, revealing detailed ionization structures and shock features, and uncovers evidence of dust vaporization in the jet's Mach disk.

Contribution

First high-resolution datacubes covering a broad spectrum of emission lines for HH 32, providing new insights into jet shock structures and dust processing.

Findings

Identification of bow shocks, Mach disks, and jet deflections.

Observation of dust vaporization in the Mach disk.

Evidence of complex excitation and shock interactions.

Abstract

We analyze datacubes of over 60 emission lines in the HH 32 stellar jet acquired with the Keck Cosmic Web Imager (KCWI). The data cover the less-explored blue portion of the spectrum between 3586A and 6351A , and have both high spectral (R $\sim$ 10000) and spatial ($\lesssim$ 1" ) resolution. The study includes all three major ionization states of oxygen, three Balmer lines, multiple lines of Fe II and Fe III, as well as the first datacubes ever acquired for important unblended diagnostic lines such as He II $\lambda$4686, Ca I $\lambda$3933, and Mg I] $\lambda$4571. The data cubes generally sort according to excitation, and have a relatively continuous progression from the highest-excitation ions (He II, O III) through the intermediate-excitation ions (O I and H I) to the lowest-excitation ions (Ca II and Mg I). Merging the KCWI cubes with HST images leads to several new insights about the flow, including evidence for bow shocks, partial bow shocks, spur shocks, Mach disks, jet deflection shocks, a wiggling jet, and potential shock precursors. The most surprising result is that one of the velocity components of Fe II in the Mach disk suddenly increases in flux relative to other lines by a factor of two, implying that the Mach disk vaporizes dust in the jet. Hence, jets must accelerate or entrain dust to speeds of over 300 km/s without destroying the grains.