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OMC-1 dust polarisation in ALMA Band 7: Diagnosing grain alignment mechanisms in the vicinity of Orion Source I

Pattle, K; Lai, S-P; Wright, M; Coudé, S; Plambeck, R; Hoang, T; Tang, Y-W; ... Ward-Thompson, D; + view all (2021) OMC-1 dust polarisation in ALMA Band 7: Diagnosing grain alignment mechanisms in the vicinity of Orion Source I. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society , 503 (3) pp. 3414-3433. 10.1093/mnras/stab608. Green open access

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Abstract

We present ALMA Band 7 polarisation observations of the OMC-1 region of the Orion molecular cloud. We find that the polarisation pattern observed in the region is likely to have been significantly altered by the radiation field of the $>10^{4}$ L$_{\odot}$ high-mass protostar Orion Source I. In the protostar's optically thick disc, polarisation is likely to arise from dust self-scattering. In material to the south of Source I - previously identified as a region of 'anomalous' polarisation emission - we observe a polarisation geometry concentric around Source I. We demonstrate that Source I's extreme luminosity may be sufficient to make the radiative precession timescale shorter than the Larmor timescale for moderately large grains ($> 0.005-0.1\,\mu$m), causing them to precess around the radiation anisotropy vector (k-RATs) rather than the magnetic field direction (B-RATs). This requires relatively unobscured emission from Source I, supporting the hypothesis that emission in this region arises from the cavity wall of the Source I outflow. This is one of the first times that evidence for k-RAT alignment has been found outside of a protostellar disc or AGB star envelope. Alternatively, the grains may remain aligned by B-RATs and trace gas infall onto the Main Ridge. Elsewhere, we largely find the magnetic field geometry to be radial around the BN/KL explosion centre, consistent with previous observations. However, in the Main Ridge, the magnetic field geometry appears to remain consistent with the larger-scale magnetic field, perhaps indicative of the ability of the dense Ridge to resist disruption by the BN/KL explosion.

Type: Article
Title: OMC-1 dust polarisation in ALMA Band 7: Diagnosing grain alignment mechanisms in the vicinity of Orion Source I
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1093/mnras/stab608
Publisher version: http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stab608
Language: English
Additional information: © 2021 The Author(s). Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Royal Astronomical Society. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Keywords: techniques: polarimetric, stars: formation, ISM: dust, extinction, ISM: magnetic fields, submillimetre: ISM
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Maths and Physical Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Maths and Physical Sciences > Dept of Physics and Astronomy
URI: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10125417
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