Discovery of 22 GHz Water Masers in the Serpens South Region

TL;DR

This study reports the first detection of 22 GHz water masers in the Serpens South region, associated with young protostars and possibly a background star, revealing insights into star formation processes and maser variability.

Contribution

First detection of 22 GHz water masers in Serpens South, linking masers to protostars and background stars, and identifying a luminosity threshold for maser occurrence.

Findings

Masers associated with three Class 0/I objects near protostars.

Detection of a background AGB star with maser emission.

Identification of a bolometric luminosity limit of ~10 L_Sun for maser hosting sources.

Abstract

Using the Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA), we have conducted a survey for 22 GHz, 6_{1,6}-5_{2,3} H2O masers toward the Serpens South region. The masers were also observed with the Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) following the VLA detections. We detect for the first time H2O masers in the Serpens South region that are found to be associated to three Class 0-Class I objects, including the two brightest protostars in the Serpens South cluster, known as CARMA-6 and CARMA-7. We also detect H2O masers associated to a source with no outflow or jet features. We suggest that this source is most probably a background AGB star projected in the direction of Serpens South. The spatial distribution of the emission spots suggest that the masers in the three Class 0-Class I objects emerge very close to the protostars and are likely excited in shocks driven by the interaction between a protostellar jet and the circumstellar material. Based on the comparison of the distributions of bolometric luminosity of sources hosting 22 GHz H2O masers and 162 YSOs covered by our observations, we identify a limit of L_Bol ~ 10 L_Sun for a source to host water masers. However, the maser emission shows strong variability in both intensity and velocity spread, and therefore masers associated to lower-luminosity sources may have been missed by our observations. We also report 11 new sources with radio continuum emission at 22 GHz.