The ISO LWS high resolution spectral survey towards Sagittarius B2

Edward T. Polehampton,1,2 Jean-Paul Baluteau,3 Bruce M. Swinyard,1 Javier R. Goicoechea,4 John M. Brown,5 Glenn J. White,1,6 José Cernicharo,7 Timothy W. Grundy,1

1Space Science & Technology Department, Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Chilton, Didcot, Oxfordshire, OX11 0QX, UK, 2Department of Physics, University of Lethbridge, 4401 University Drive, Lethbridge, Alberta, T1J 1B1, Canada, 3Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de Marseille, CNRS & Université de Provence, BP 8, F-13376 Marseille Cedex 12, France, 4LERMA, UMR 811, CNRS, Observatoire de Paris et École Normale Supérieure, 24 rue Lhomond, 75231 Paris Cedex 05, France, 5Physical and Theoretical Chemistry Laboratory, South Parks Road, Oxford, OX1 3QZ, UK, 6Department of Physics and Astronomy, Open University, Venables Building, Milton Keynes, MK6 7AA, UK, 7Departmento de Astrofísica Molecular e Infrarroja, IEM, CSIC, Serrano 121, 28006, Madrid, Spain

Paper: MNRAS, accepted

EPrint Server: astro-ph/0702725


Abstract:

A full spectral survey was carried out towards the Giant Molecular Cloud complex, Sagittarius B2 (Sgr B2), using the ISO Long Wavelength Spectrometer Fabry-Pérot mode. This provided complete wavelength coverage in the range 47-196 micron (6.38-1.53 THz) with a spectral resolution of 30-40 km s-1. This is an unique dataset covering wavelengths inaccessible from the ground. It is an extremely important region of the spectrum as it contains both the peak of the thermal emission from dust, and crucial spectral lines of key atomic (OI, CII, OIII, NII and NIII) and molecular species (NH3, NH2, NH, H2O, OH, H3O^+, CH, CH2, C3, HF and H2D^+). In total, 95 spectral lines have been identified and 11 features with absorption depth greater than 3 sigma remain unassigned. Most of the molecular lines are seen in absorption against the strong continuum, whereas the atomic and ionic lines appear in emission (except for absorption in the OI 63 micron and CII 158 micron lines). Sgr B2 is located close to the Galactic Centre and so many of the features also show a broad absorption profile due to material located along the line of sight. A full description of the survey dataset is given with an overview of each detected species and final line lists for both assigned and unassigned features.


Preprints available from the authors at E.T.Polehampton@rl.ac.uk , or the raw TeX (no figures) if you click here.

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