FIlaments Extremely Long and Dark: a Magnetic Polarization Survey: A SOFIA Legacy Program
Event date
-
Speaker
Ian Stephens
Affiliation
Worcester State University and Harvard CfA
Location
Online
Event Type
Teletalk

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Molecular gas in a galaxy generally follows the spiral arms. In the Milky Way, the densest of this molecular gas can form long, velocity-coherent filaments parallel and in close proximity to the Galactic plane. These dense filaments make up the 'skeleton' of molecular gas of the Milky Way and thus have been called 'bones.' We have launched a SOFIA Legacy program called FIELDMAPS in which we are using HAWC+ Band E (214 um) to map the magnetic fields across 10 Galactic bones. The talk will primarily focus on the recently published FIELDMAPS results on the G47 bone. Contrary to expectations, magnetic fields are not always parallel or perpendicular to the bones. The fields are structured, and based on estimates of the field strength, the bone has significant magnetic support against gravitational collapse. HAWC+ magnetic field maps of 6 other bones will also be shown.

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