Characterizing Magnetic Properties of Young Protostars in Orion
Abstract The B -field Orion Protostellar Survey (BOPS) recently obtained polarimetric observations at 870 μ m toward 61 protostars in the Orion molecular clouds with ∼1″ spatial resolution using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array. From the BOPS sample, we selected the 26 protostars with extended polarized emission within a radius of ∼6″ (2400 au) around the protostar. This allows us to have sufficient statistical polarization data to infer the magnetic field strength. The magnetic field strength is derived using the Davis–Chandrasekhar–Fermi method. The underlying magnetic field strengths are approximately 2.0 mG for protostars with a standard hourglass magnetic field morphology, which is higher than the values derived for protostars with rotated hourglass, spiral, and complex magnetic field configurations (≲1.0 mG). This suggests that the magnetic field plays a more significant role in envelopes exhibiting a standard hourglass field morphology, and a value of ≳2.0 mG would be required to maintain such a structure at these scales. Furthermore, most protostars in the sample are slightly supercritical, with mass-to-flux ratios ≲3.0. In particular, the mass-to-flux ratios for all protostars with a standard hourglass magnetic field morphology are lower than 3.0. However, these ratios do not account for the contribution of the protostellar mass, which means they are likely significantly underestimated.
Authors
- Paulo C. Cortés (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3583-780X)
- John M. Carpenter (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2251-0602)
- Philip C. Myers (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2885-1806)
- Nadia M. Murillo
- S. T. Megeath (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7629-3573)
- Bo Huang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7393-8583)
- Á. Sánchez-Monge (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3078-9482)
- Woojin Kwon (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4022-4132)
- Leslie W. Looney (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4540-6587)
- J. M. Girart (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3829-5591)
- Sarah Sadavoy (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7474-6874)
- Ian Stephens (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3017-4418)
- Valentin J. M. Le Gouellec (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5714-799X)
- Manuel Fernández-López (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5811-0454)
- Nicole Karnath (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3682-854X)
- Zhi‐Yun Li (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7402-6487)
- Qizhou Zhang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2384-6589)
- Junhao Liu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4774-2998)
Institutions
- Ames Research Center (US)
- Space Science Institute (US)
- Seoul National University (KR)
- University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (US)
- Seoul National University of Education (KR)
- Queen's University (CA)
- National Radio Astronomy Observatory (US)
- Atacama Large Millimeter Submillimeter Array (CL)
- Worcester State University (US)
- Institut d'Estudis Espacials de Catalunya (ES)
- Institute of Space Sciences (ES)
- RIKEN (JP)
- Center for Astrophysics Harvard & Smithsonian (US)
- Instituto Argentino de Radioastronomía (AR)
- National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (JP)
- University of Virginia (US)
- Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (MX)
- University of Toledo (US)
Publication Details
- Journal
- The Astrophysical Journal
- Published
- 2025-04-22
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/adc30b
- Citations
- 4
- Primary Topic
- Astrophysics and Star Formation Studies
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 4.62