Massive stars drive the evolution of the interstellar medium through their radiative and mechanical energy input. After their birth, they form "bubbles" of hot gas surrounded by a dense shell. Traditionally, the formation of bubbles is explained through the input of a powerful stellar wind, even though direct evidence supporting this scenario is lacking. Here we explore the possibility that interstellar bubbles seen by the Spitzer-and Herschel space telescopes, blown by stars with log(L/L ) 5.2, form and expand because of the thermal pressure that accompanies the ionization of the surrounding gas. We show that density gradients in the natal cloud or a puncture in the swept-up shell lead to an ionized gas flow through the bubble into the general interstellar medium, which is traced by a dust wave near the star, which demonstrates the importance of radiation pressure during this phase. Dust waves provide a natural explanation for the presence of dust inside H II bubbles, offer a novel method to study dust in H II regions and provide direct evidence that bubbles are relieving their pressure into the interstellar medium through a champagne flow, acting as a probe of the radiative interaction of a massive star with its surroundings. We explore a parameter space connecting the ambient density, the ionizing source luminosity, and the position of the dust wave, while using the well studied H II bubbles RCW 120 and RCW 82 as benchmarks of our model. Finally, we briefly examine the implications of our study for the environments of super star clusters formed in ultraluminous infrared galaxies, merging galaxies, and the early Universe, which occur in very luminous and dense environments and where radiation pressure is expected to dominate the dynamical evolution.

The emission line ratios [ O III ] λ5007/Hβ and [ N II ] λ6584/Hα have been adopted as an empirical way to distinguish between the fundamentally different mechanisms of ionization in emission-line galaxies. However, detailed interpretation of these diagnostics requires calculations of the internal structure of the emitting H II regions, and these calculations depend on the assumptions one makes about the relative importance of radiation pressure and stellar winds. In this paper we construct a grid of quasi-static H II region models to explore how choices about these parameters alter H II regions' emission line ratios. We find that, when radiation pressure is included in our models, H II regions reach a saturation point beyond which further increases in the luminosity of the driving stars does not produce any further increase in effective ionization parameter, and thus does not yield any further alteration in an H II region's line ratio. We also show that, if stellar winds are assumed to be strong, the maximum possible ionization parameter is quite low. As a result of this effect, it is inconsistent to simultaneously assume that H II regions are wind-blown bubbles and that they have high ionization parameters; some popular H II region models suffer from this inconsistency. Our work in this paper provides a foundation for a companion paper in which we embed the model grids we compute here within a population synthesis code that enables us to compute the integrated line emission from galactic populations of H II regions.

Optical and infrared emission lines from H II regions are an important diagnostic used to study galaxies, but interpretation of these lines requires significant modeling of both the internal structure and dynamical evolution of the emitting regions. Most of the models in common use today assume that H II region dynamics are dominated by the expansion of stellar wind bubbles, and have neglected the contribution of radiation pressure to the dynamics, and in some cases also to the internal structure. However, recent observations of nearby galaxies suggest that neither assumption is justified, motivating us to revisit the question of how H II region line emission depends on the physics of winds and radiation pressure. In a companion paper we construct models of single H II regions including and excluding radiation pressure and winds, and in this paper we describe a population synthesis code that uses these models to simulate galactic collections of H II regions with varying physical parameters. We show that the choice of physical parameters has significant effects on galactic emission line ratios, and that in some cases the line ratios can exceed previously claimed theoretical limits. Our results suggest that the recently-reported offset in line ratio values between high-redshift star-forming galaxies and those in the local universe may be partially explained by the presence of large numbers of radiation pressured-dominated H II regions within them.

The Astronomy For Development Focus Meeting 20 at the IAU General Assembly encompassed an ‘Unconference’ session as part of the proceedings. Unstructured conferences, with their potential to unleash innovative ideas, are gaining traction in various conferences and symposia. Astronomy For Development is a field that is applicable to the entire Astronomy community (and even beyond) and hence an unconference inviting ideas and fostering frank dialogue is very pertinent.Officially one of the final sessions of the the 2015 General Assembly, the unconference session was intended to provide a balanced platform for a diverse set of participants and act as an informal setting to promote open discussion on topics of relevance to Astronomy for Development.