Abstract
INTERSTELLAR cloud structures, typically 10–30 pc long and 3–5 pc wide, are often seen extending outwards from dense clouds that show marked enhancement of star formation within them. We have used the Nagoya 4-m radiotelescope to study one such "streamer", LI641, a part of the giant molecular-cloud complex in Orion, lying south of the Kleinmann–Low (KL) nebula. Using the 110-GHz line of13CO (J = l–0), we have obtained intensity and velocity data, and find within the streamer a dense filament with a helical structure, spinning in the same sense as the gas in the Orion KL region. We propose a model for this structure in which the streamer, through the action of the interstellar magnetic field, acts as an angular-momentum drain on the Orion KL region, allowing it to collapse. In this model, the ∼30-pc-long streamer is essential to the formation of the cloud, as well as the formation of stars within the dense cloud.
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Uchida, Y., Fukui, Y., Minoshima, Y. et al. Evidence for a rotating helical filament in L1641, part of the Orion cloud complex. Nature 349, 140–142 (1991). https://doi.org/10.1038/349140a0
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Further reading
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Filamentary structure of the ISM at high latitudes
Astrophysics and Space Science (1993)
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Formation of giant molecular clouds and helical magnetic fields by the Parker instability
Nature (1991)
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