Context. Molecular lines and line ratios are commonly used to infer properties of extra-galactic star forming regions. The new generation of millimeter receivers almost turns every observation into a line survey. Full exploitation of this technical advancement in extra-galactic study requires detailed bench-marking of available line diagnostics. Aims. We aim to develop the Orion B giant molecular cloud (GMC) as a local template for interpreting extra-galactic molecular line observations. Methods. We use the wide-band receiver at the IRAM-30 m to spatially and spectrally resolve the Orion B GMC. The observations cover almost 1 square degree at 26 resolution with a bandwidth of 32 GHz from 84 to 116 GHz in only two tunings. Results. We introduce the molecular anatomy of the Orion B GMC, including relationships between line intensities and gas column density or far-UV radiation fields, and correlations between selected line and line ratios. We also obtain a dust-traced gas mass that is less than approximately one third the CO-traced mass, using the standard X CO conversion factor. The presence of over-luminous CO can be traced back to the dependence of the CO intensity on UV illumination. As a matter of fact, while most lines show some dependence on the UV radiation field, CN and C 2 H are the most sensitive. Moreover, dense cloud cores are almost exclusively traced by N 2 H + . Other traditional high-density tracers, such as HCN(1−0), are also easily detected in extended translucent regions at a typical density of ∼500 H 2 cm −3 . In general, we find no straightforward relationship between line critical density and the fraction of the line luminosity coming from dense gas regions. Conclusions. Our initial findings demonstrate that the relationships between line (ratio) intensities and environment in GMCs are more complicated than often assumed. Sensitivity (i.e., the molecular column density), excitation, and, above all, chemistry contribute to the observed line intensity distributions, and they must be considered together when developing the next generation of extra-galactic molecular line diagnostics of mass, density, temperature, and radiation field.

In diffuse interstellar clouds the chemistry that leads to the formation of the oxygen-bearing ions OH + , H 2 O + , and H 3 O + begins with the ionization of atomic hydrogen by cosmic rays, and continues through subsequent hydrogen abstraction reactions involving H 2. Given these reaction pathways, the observed abundances of these molecules are useful in constraining both the total cosmic-ray ionization rate of atomic hydrogen (ζ H) and molecular hydrogen fraction (f H 2). We present observations targeting transitions of OH + , H 2 O + , and H 3 O + made with the Herschel Space Observatory along 20 Galactic sight lines toward bright submillimeter continuum sources. Both OH + and H 2 O + are detected in absorption in multiple velocity components along every sight line, but H 3 O + is only detected along 7 sight lines. From the molecular abundances we compute f H 2 in multiple distinct components along each line of sight, and find a Gaussian distribution with mean and standard deviation 0.042 ± 0.018. This confirms previous findings that OH + and H 2 O + primarily reside in gas with low H 2 fractions. We also infer ζ H throughout our sample, and find a lognormal distribution with mean log(ζ H) = −15.75 (ζ H = 1.78 × 10 −16 s −1) and standard deviation 0.29 for gas within the Galactic disk, but outside of the Galactic center. This is in good agreement with the mean and distribution of cosmic-ray ionization rates previously inferred from H + 3 observations. Ionization rates in the Galactic center tend to be 10-100 times larger than found in the Galactic disk, also in accord with prior studies.

Context. Understanding the physical phenomena involved in the earlierst stages of protostellar evolution requires knowledge of the heating and cooling processes that occur in the surroundings of a young stellar object. Spatially resolved information from its constituent gas and dust provides the necessary constraints to distinguish between different theories of accretion energy dissipation into the envelope. Aims. Our aims are to quantify the far-infrared line emission from low-mass protostars and the contribution of different atomic and molecular species to the gas cooling budget, to determine the spatial extent of the emission, and to investigate the underlying excitation conditions. Analysis of the line cooling will help us characterize the evolution of the relevant physical processes as the protostar ages. Methods. Far-infrared Herschel-PACS spectra of 18 low-mass protostars of various luminosities and evolutionary stages are studied in the context of the WISH key program. For most targets, the spectra include many wavelength intervals selected to cover specific CO, H 2 O, OH, and atomic lines. For four targets the spectra span the entire 55-200 μm region. The PACS field-of-view covers ∼47 with the resolution of 9.4 . Results. Most of the protostars in our sample show strong atomic and molecular far-infrared emission. Water is detected in 17 out of 18 objects (except TMC1A), including 5 Class I sources. The high-excitation H 2 O 8 18 -7 07 63.3 μm line (E u /k B = 1071 K) is detected in 7 sources. CO transitions from J = 14−13 up to J = 49−48 are found and show two distinct temperature components on Boltzmann diagrams with rotational temperatures of ∼350 K and ∼700 K. H 2 O has typical excitation temperatures of ∼150 K. Emission from both Class 0 and I sources is usually spatially extended along the outflow direction but with a pattern that depends on the species and the transition. In the extended sources, emission is stronger off source and extended on ≥10 000 AU scales; in the compact sample, more than half of the flux originates within 1000 AU of the protostar. The Conclusions. The PACS data probe at least two physical components. The H 2 O and CO emission very likely arises in non-dissociative (irradiated) shocks along the outflow walls with a range of pre-shock densities. Some OH is also associated with this component, most likely resulting from H 2 O photodissociation. UV-heated gas contributes only a minor fraction to the CO emission observed by PACS, based on the strong correlation between the shock-dominated CO 24-23 line and the CO 14-13 line. [O i] and some of the OH emission probe dissociative shocks in the inner envelope. The total far-infrared cooling is dominated by H 2 O and CO, with the fraction contributed by [O i] increasing for Class I sources. Consistent with previous studies, the ratio of total far-infrared line emission over bolometric luminosity decreases with the evolutionary state.

We perform a sensitive (line confusion limited), single-side band spectral survey towards Orion KL with the IRAM 30 m telescope, covering the following frequency ranges: 80−115.5 GHz, 130−178 GHz, and 197−281 GHz. We detect more than 14 400 spectral features of which 10 040 have been identified up to date and attributed to 43 different molecules, including 148 isotopologues and lines from vibrationally excited states. In this paper, we focus on the study of OCS, HCS + , H 2 CS, CS, CCS, C 3 S, and their isotopologues. In addition, we map the OCS J = 18−17 line and complete complementary observations of several OCS lines at selected positions around Orion IRc2 (the position selected for the survey). We report the first detection of OCS ν 2 = 1 and ν 3 = 1 vibrationally excited states in space and the first detection of C 3 S in warm clouds. Most of CCS, and almost all C 3 S, line emission arises from the hot core indicating an enhancement of their abundances in warm and dense gas. Column densities and isotopic ratios have been calculated using a large velocity gradient (LVG) excitation and radiative transfer code (for the low density gas components) and a local thermal equilibrium (LTE) code (appropriate for the warm and dense hot core component), which takes into account the different cloud components known to exist towards Orion KL, the extended ridge, compact ridge, plateau, and hot core. The vibrational temperature derived from OCS ν 2 = 1 and ν 3 = 1 levels is 210 K, similar to the gas kinetic temperature in the hot core. These OCS high energy levels are probably pumped by absorption of IR dust photons. We derive an upper limit to the OC 3 S, H 2 CCS, HNCS, HOCS + , and NCS column densities. Finally, we discuss the D/H abundance ratio and infer the following isotopic abundances: 12 C/ 13 C = 45 ± 20, 32 S/ 34 S = 20 ± 6, 32 S/ 33 S = 75 ± 29, and 16 O/ 18 O = 250 ± 135.

We model the production of OH + , H 2 O + , and H 3 O + in interstellar clouds, using a steady state photodissociation region code that treats the freeze-out of gas species, grain surface chemistry, and desorption of ices from grains. The code includes PAHs, which have important effects on the chemistry. All three ions generally have two peaks in abundance as a function of depth into the cloud, one at A V < ∼ 1 and one at A V ∼ 3 − 8, the exact values depending on the ratio of incident ultraviolet flux to gas density. For relatively low values of the incident far ultraviolet flux on the cloud (χ < ∼ 1000; χ = 1= local interstellar value), the columns of OH + and H 2 O + scale roughly as the cosmic ray primary ionization rate ζ crp divided by the hydrogen nucleus density n. The H 3 O + column is dominated by the second peak, and we show that if PAHs are present, N (H 3 O + )∼ 4 × 10 13 cm −2 independent of ζ crp or n. If there are no PAHs or very small grains at the second peak, N (H 3 O + ) can attain such columns only if low ionization potential metals are heavily depleted. We also model diffuse and translucent clouds in the interstellar medium, and show how observations of N (OH + )/N (H) and N (OH + )/N (H 2 O + ) can be used to estimate ζ crp /n, χ/n and A V in them. We compare our models to Herschel observations of these two ions, and estimate ζ crp ∼ 4 − 6 × 10 −16 (n/100 cm −3 ) s −1 and χ/n = 0.03 cm 3 for diffuse foreground clouds towards W49N.

We present the first ~7.5'×11.5' velocity-resolved (~0.2 km s) map of the [C ii] 158 m line toward the Orion molecular cloud 1 (OMC 1) taken with the/HIFI instrument. In combination with far-infrared (FIR) photometric images and velocity-resolved maps of the H41 hydrogen recombination and CO =2-1 lines, this data set provides an unprecedented view of the intricate small-scale kinematics of the ionized/PDR/molecular gas interfaces and of the radiative feedback from massive stars. The main contribution to the [C ii] luminosity (~85 %) is from the extended, FUV-illuminated face of the cloud (>500, >5×10 cm) and from dense PDRs (≳10, ≳10 cm) at the interface between OMC 1 and the H ii region surrounding the Trapezium cluster. Around ~15 % of the [C ii] emission arises from a different gas component without CO counterpart. The [C ii] excitation, PDR gas turbulence, line opacity (from [C ii]) and role of the geometry of the illuminating stars with respect to the cloud are investigated. We construct maps of the [C ii]/ and / ratios and show that [C ii]/ decreases from the extended cloud component (~10-10) to the more opaque star-forming cores (~10-10). The lowest values are reminiscent of the "[C ii] deficit" seen in local ultra-luminous IR galaxies hosting vigorous star formation. Spatial correlation analysis shows that the decreasing [C ii]/ ratio correlates better with the column density of dust through the molecular cloud than with /. We conclude that the [C ii] emitting column relative to the total dust column along each line of sight is responsible for the observed [C ii]/ variations through the cloud.

Context. Pure gas-phase chemistry models do not succeed in reproducing the measured abundances of small hydrocarbons in the interstellar medium. Information on key gas-phase progenitors of these molecules sheds light on this problem. Aims. We aim to constrain the chemical content of the Horsehead mane with a millimeter unbiased line survey at two positions, namely the photo-dissociation region (PDR) and the nearby shielded core. This project revealed a consistent set of eight unidentified lines toward the PDR position. We associate them to the l-C 3 H + hydrocarbon cation, which enables us to constrain the chemistry of small hydrocarbons. We observed the lowest detectable J line in the millimeter domain along a cut toward the illuminating direction to constrain the spatial distribution of the l-C 3 H + emission perpendicular to the photo-dissociation front. Methods. We simultaneously fit 1) the rotational and centrifugal distortion constants of a linear rotor; and 2) the Gaussian line shapes located at the eight predicted frequencies. A rotational diagram is then used to infer the excitation temperature and the column density. We finally compare the abundance to the results of the Meudon PDR photochemical model. Results. Six out of the eight unidentified lines observable in the millimeter bands are detected with a signal-to-noise ratio from 6 to 19 toward the Horsehead PDR, while the two last ones are tentatively detected. Mostly noise appears at the same frequency toward the dense core, located less than 40 away. Moreover, the spatial distribution of the species integrated emission has a shape similar to radical species such as HCO, and small hydrocarbons such as C 2 H, which show enhanced abundances toward the PDR. The observed lines can be accurately fitted with a linear rotor model, implying a 1 Σ ground electronic state. The deduced rotational constant value is B = 11 244.9512 ± 0.0015 MHz, close to that of l-C 3 H. Conclusions. This is the first detection of the l-C 3 H + hydrocarbon in the interstellar medium. Laboratory spectroscopy is underway to confirm these results. Interferometric imaging is needed to firmly constrain the small hydrocarbon chemistry in the Horsehead.

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