We have conducted a survey of 328 protostars in the Orion molecular clouds with the Atacama Large Millimeter/ submillimeter Array at 0.87 mm at a resolution of ∼0 1 (40 au), including observations with the Very Large Array at 9mm toward 148 protostars at a resolution of ∼0 08 (32 au). This is the largest multiwavelength survey of protostars at this resolution by an order of magnitude. We use the dust continuum emission at 0.87 and 9mm to measure the dust disk radii and masses toward the Class 0, Class I, and flat-spectrum protostars, characterizing the evolution of these disk properties in the protostellar phase. The mean dust disk radii for the Class 0, Class I, and flat-spectrum protostars are -+ 44.9 3.4 5.8 , -+ 37.0 3.0 4.9 , and -+ 28.5 2.3 3.7 au, respectively, and the mean protostellar dust disk masses are 25.9 -+ 4.0 7.7 , -+ 14.9 2.2 3.8 , -+11.6 1.93.5 Å M , respectively. The decrease in dust disk masses is expected from disk evolution and accretion, but the decrease in disk radii may point to the initial conditions of star formation not leading to the systematic growth of disk radii or that radial drift is keeping the dust disk sizes small. At least 146 protostellar disks (35% of 379 detected 0.87 mm continuum sources plus 42 nondetections) have disk radii greater than 50 au in our sample. These properties are not found to vary significantly between different regions within Orion. The protostellar dust disk mass distributions are systematically larger than those of Class II disks by a factor of >4, providing evidence that the cores of giant planets may need to at least begin their formation during the protostellar phase.

A star like the Sun becomes a planetary nebula towards the end of its life, when the envelope ejected during the earlier giant phase becomes photoionized as the surface of the remnant star reaches a temperature of approximately 30,000 K. The spherical symmetry of the giant phase is lost in the transition to a planetary nebula, when non-spherical shells and powerful jets develop. Molecules that were present in the giant envelope are progressively destroyed by the radiation. The water-vapour masers that are typical of the giant envelopes therefore are not expected to persist in planetary nebulae. Here we report the detection of water-maser emission from the planetary nebula K3-35. The masers are in a magnetized torus with a radius of about 85 astronomical units and are also found at the surprisingly large distance of about 5,000 astronomical units from the star, in the tips of bipolar lobes of gas. The precessing jets from K3-35 are probably involved in the excitation of the distant masers, although their existence is nevertheless puzzling. We infer that K3-35 is being observed at the very moment of its transformation from a giant star to a planetary nebula.

The processes leading to the birth of low-mass stars such as our Sun have been well studied, but the formation of high-mass (> 8 x Sun's mass) stars has heretofore remained poorly understood. Recent observational studies suggest that high-mass stars may form in essentially the same way as low-mass stars, namely via an accretion process, instead of via merging of several low-mass (< 8 Msun) stars. However, there is as yet no conclusive evidence. Here, we report the discovery of a flattened disk-like structure observed at submillimeter wavelengths, centered on a massive 15 Msun protostar in the Cepheus-A region. The disk, with a radius of about 330 astronomical units (AU) and a mass of 1 to 8 Msun, is detected in dust continuum as well as in molecular line emission. Its perpendicular orientation to, and spatial coincidence with the central embedded powerful bipolar radio jet, provides the best evidence yet that massive stars form via disk accretion in direct analogy to the formation of low-mass stars

Synchrotron emission is commonly found in relativistic jets from active galactic nuclei (AGNs) and microquasars, but so far its presence in jets from young stellar objects (YSOs) has not been proved. Here, we present evidence of polarized synchrotron emission arising from the jet of a YSO. The apparent magnetic field, with strength of ~0.2 milligauss, is parallel to the jet axis, and the polarization degree increases toward the jet edges, as expected for a confining helical magnetic field configuration. These characteristics are similar to those found in AGN jets, hinting at a common origin of all astrophysical jets.

Using high angular resolution ($0B25-0B05) Very Large Array (VLA) observations made at 3.6 cm, 1.3 cm, and 7 mm during the period 1991-2004, we report the detection of large proper motions in the components of the radio continuum jet associated with the high-mass young stellar object (YSO) HW2 in the star-forming region Cepheus A. The relative proper motions observed for the two main components of the outflow, moving away from the central source in nearly opposite directions, are of the order of 140 mas yr À1 , or $480 km s À1 at a distance of 725 pc. The proper motions observed in the northeast and southwest lobes are not completely antiparallel, and the central elongated source seems to be changing orientation. We discuss possible scenarios to account for these and other observed characteristics. We also report the detection of a 7 mm compact continuum condensation of emission near the center of the thermal radio continuum jet, which we propose as the location of the exciting star.

We report observations of the J = (1-0) C 18 O molecular emission line toward the L977 molecular cloud. To study the correlation between C 18 O emission and dust extinction we constructed a gaussian smoothed map of the infrared extinction measured by Alves et al. (1998) at the same angular resolution (50) as our molecular-line observations. This enabled a direct comparison of C 18 O integrated intensities and column densities with dust extinction over a relatively large range of cloud depth (2 < A V < 30 mag) at 240 positions inside L977. We find a good linear correlation between these two column density tracers for cloud depths corresponding to A V ≤ 10 magnitudes. For cloud depths above this threshold there is a notable break in the linear correlation. Although optically thick C 18 O emission could produce this departure from linearity, CO depletion in the denser, coldest regions of L977 may be the most likely cause of the break in the observed correlation. We directly derive the C 18 O abundance in this cloud over a broad range of cloud depths and find it to be virtually the same as that derived for IC 5146 from the data of Lada et al. (1994). Our results suggest that the use of C 18 O as a column density tracer in molecular clouds can lead to a 10 to 30% underestimation of overall cloud mass. In regions of very high extinction (A V > 10 mag), such as dense cores, our results suggest that C 18 O would be a very poor tracer of mass. We estimate the minimum total column density required to shield C 18 O from the interstellar radiation field to be 1.6 ± 0.5 magnitudes of visual extinction.

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Jets and outflows are ubiquitous in the process of formation of stars since outflow is intimately associated with accretion. Free-free (thermal) radio continuum emission in the centimeter domain is associated with these jets. The emission is relatively weak and compact, and sensitive radio interferometers of high angular resolution are required to detect and study it. One of the key problems in the study of outflows is to determine how they are accelerated and collimated. Observations in the cm range are most useful to trace the base of the ionized jets, close to the young central object and the inner parts of its accretion disk, where optical or near-IR imaging is made difficult by the high extinction present. Radio recombination lines in jets (in combination with proper motions) should provide their 3D kinematics at very small scale (near their origin). Future instruments such as the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) and the Next Generation Very Large Array (ngVLA) will be crucial to perform this kind of sensitive observations. Thermal jets are associated with both high and low mass protostars and possibly even with objects in the substellar domain. The ionizing mechanism of these radio jets appears to be related to shocks in the associated outflows, as suggested by the observed correlation between the centimeter luminosity and the outflow momentum rate. From this correlation and that of the centimeter luminosity with the bolometric luminosity of the system it will be possible to discriminate between unresolved HII regions and jets, and to infer additional physical properties of the embedded objects. Some jets associated with young stellar objects (YSOs) show indications of nonthermal emission (negative spectral indices) in part of their lobes. Linearly polarized synchrotron emission has been found in the jet of HH 80-81, allowing one to measure the direction and intensity of the jet magnetic field, a key ingredient to determine the collimation and ejection mechanisms. As only a fraction of the emission is polarized, very sensitive observations such as those that will be feasible with the interferometers previously mentioned are required to perform studies in a large sample of sources. Jets are present in many kinds of astrophysical scenarios. Characterizing radio jets in YSOs, where thermal emission allows one to determine their physical conditions in a reliable way, would also be useful in understanding acceleration and collimation mechanisms in all kinds of astrophysical jets, such as those associated with stellar and supermassive black holes and planetary nebulae.