Parameters of the Radcliffe wave from masers, radio stars and T Tauri stars

TL;DR

This study analyzes the Radcliffe wave's structure and kinematics using masers, radio stars, and young stars, revealing it as a localized high-amplitude feature with specific geometric and velocity characteristics.

Contribution

It provides new estimates of the Radcliffe wave's parameters based on spectral analysis and Gaia data, highlighting its localized nature and differences in amplitude and wavelength.

Findings

Radcliffe wave has a maximum vertical displacement of about 87 pc.

Wavelength of the wave varies between 2.0 and 3.9 kpc.

Vertical velocity perturbation reaches approximately 5.1 km/s.

Abstract

The presence of the Radcliffe wave is shown both in the positions and in the vertical velocities of masers and radio stars belonging to the Local Arm. This gives the impression that the structure of the Radcliffe wave is not a wave in the full sense of the word. It is more like a local high-amplitude burst, rapidly fading away. Moreover, this structure has the largest amplitude in the immediate vicinity of the Sun, where the main ``contributors'' are the Gould Belt stars. Based on the spectral analysis of masers, the following estimates of the geometric and kinematic characteristics of the wave were obtained: the largest value of the vertical coordinate $z_{max}=87\pm4$ pc and the wavelength $\lambda=2.8\pm0.1$ kpc, the vertical velocity perturbation amplitude reaches $W_{max}=5.1\pm0.7$ km s$^{-1}$ and the wavelength found from vertical velocities is $\lambda=3.9\pm1.6$ kpc. The Radcliffe wave also manifests itself in the positions of very young stars that have not reached the main sequence stage. We extracted a sample of such stars from the Gaia DR2$\times$AllWISE database and obtained the following estimates from them: $z_{max}=118\pm3$ pc and wavelength $\lambda=2.0\pm0.1$ kpc.