COLLISIONALLY EXCITED FILAMENTS IN HUBBLE SPACE TELESCOPE Hα AND Hβ IMAGES OF HH 1/2

Journal Article · Thu Jan 01 04:00:00 EST 2015 · Astrophysical Journal Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1088/2041-8205/798/1/L1· OSTI ID:22364778

Raga, A. C.; Castellanos-Ramírez, A. ^[1]; Reipurth, B.; Chiang, Hsin-Fang ^[2]

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1. Instituto de Ciencias Nucleares, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Ap. 70-543, 04510 México, D.F. (Mexico)
2. Institute for Astronomy, University of Hawaii at Manoa, Hilo, HI 96720 (United States)

We present new Hα and Hβ images of the HH 1/2 system, and we find that the Hα/Hβ ratio has high values in ridges along the leading edges of the HH 1 bow shock and of the brighter condensations of HH 2. These ridges have Hα/Hβ = 4 → 6, which is consistent with collisional excitation from the n = 1 to the n = 3 and 4 levels of hydrogen in a gas of temperatures T = 1.5 → 10 × 10{sup 4} K. This is therefore the first direct evidence that the collisional excitation/ionization region of hydrogen just behind Herbig-Haro shock fronts is detected.

• OSTI ID: 22364778
• Journal Information: Astrophysical Journal Letters, Journal Name: Astrophysical Journal Letters Journal Issue: 1 Vol. 798; ISSN 2041-8205
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS
EXCITATION
FILAMENTS
HERBIG-HARO OBJECTS
HYDROGEN
IMAGES
IONIZATION
JETS
SHOCK WAVES
SPACE
STARS
STELLAR WINDS
TELESCOPES