Detection of polarized mm and sub-mm emission from Sgr A*

D.K. Aitken(1,4), J. Greaves(2), Antonio Chrysostomou(1,2) W. Holland(1), J.H. Hough(2), D. Pierce-Price(3) J. Richer(3)


(1) Dept. of Physical Sciences, University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield, Herts, AL10 9AB, U.K.
(2) Joint Astronomy Centre, 660 N. A`oh\=ok\=u Place, University Park, Hilo, HI 96720, U.S.A.
(3) Cavendish Laboratory, Madingley Road, Cambridge, CB3 0HE, U.K.
(4) email: d.aitken@star.herts.ac.uk

Paper: ApJ Letters, accepted 23 Mar. 2000

Weblink: http://star.herts.ac.uk/~acc/pubs.html

EPrint Server: astro-ph/0003379


Abstract:

We report the detection of linear polarization from Sgr A* at 750, 850, 1350 and 2000 micron which confirms the contribution of synchrotron radiation. From the lack of polarization at longer wavelengths it appears to arise in the millimetre/sub-millimetre excess. There are large position angle changes between the millimetre and sub-millimetre results and these are discussed in terms of a polarized dust contribution in the sub-millimetre and various synchrotron models. In the model which best explains the data the synchrotron radiation from the excess is self-absorbed in the millimetre region and becomes optically thin in the sub-millimetre. This implies that the excess arises in an extremely compact source 2 Schwarzschild radii.


Preprints available from the authors at acc@star.herts.ac.uk , or the raw TeX (no figures) if you click here.

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