We mapped the kinetic temperature structure of the Orion molecular cloud 1 (OMC-1) with para-H 2 CO (J KaKc = 3 03 -2 02 , 3 22 -2 21 , and 3 21 -2 20 ) using the APEX 12 m telescope. This is compared with the temperatures derived from the ratio of the NH 3 (2,2)/(1,1) inversion lines and the dust emission. Using the RADEX non-LTE model, we derive the gas kinetic temperature modeling the measured averaged line ratios of para-H 2 CO 3 22 -2 21 /3 03 -2 02 and 3 21 -2 20 /3 03 -2 02 . The gas kinetic temperatures derived from the para-H 2 CO line ratios are warm, ranging from 30 to >200 K with an average of 62 ± 2 K at a spatial density of 10 5 cm −3 . These temperatures are higher than those obtained from NH 3 (2,2)/(1,1) and CH 3 CCH (6-5) in the OMC-1 region. The gas kinetic temperatures derived from para-H 2 CO agree with those obtained from warm dust components measured in the mid infrared (MIR), which indicates that the para-H 2 CO (3-2) ratios trace dense and warm gas. The cold dust components measured in the far infrared (FIR) are consistent with those measured with NH 3 (2,2)/(1,1) and the CH 3 CCH (6-5) line series. With dust at MIR wavelengths and para-H 2 CO (3-2) on one side and dust at FIR wavelengths, NH 3 (2,2)/(1,1), and CH 3 CCH (6-5) on the other, dust and gas temperatures appear to be equivalent in the dense gas (n(H 2 ) 10 4 cm −3 ) of the OMC-1 region, but provide a bimodal distribution, one more directly related to star formation than the other. The non-thermal velocity dispersions of para-H 2 CO are positively correlated with the gas kinetic temperatures in regions of strong non-thermal motion (Mach number 2.5) of the OMC-1, implying that the higher temperature traced by para-H 2 CO is related to turbulence on a ∼0.06 pc scale. Combining the temperature measurements with para-H 2 CO and NH 3 (2,2)/(1,1) line ratios, we find direct evidence for the dense gas along the northern part of the OMC-1 10 km s −1 filament heated by radiation from the central Orion nebula.

We have developed an iterative procedure to systematically combine the millimeter and submillimeter images of OB cluster-forming molecular clouds, which were taken by ground based (CSO, JCMT, APEX, IRAM-30m) and space telescopes (Herschel, Planck). For the seven luminous (L>10 6 L ) Galactic OB cluster-forming molecular clouds selected for our analyses, namely W49A, W43-Main, W43-South, W33, G10.6-0.4, G10.2-0.3, G10.3-0.1, we have performed single-component, modified black-body fits to each pixel of the combined (sub)millimeter images, and the Herschel PACS and SPIRE images at shorter wavelengths. The ∼10 resolution dust column density and temperature maps of these sources revealed dramatically different morphologies, indicating very different modes of OB cluster-formation, or parent molecular cloud structures in different evolutionary stages. The molecular clouds W49A, W33, and G10.6-0.4 show centrally concentrated massive molecular clumps that are connected with approximately radially orientated molecular gas filaments. The W43-Main and W43-South molecular cloud complexes, which are located at the intersection of the Galactic near 3-kpc (or Scutum) arm and the Galactic bar, show a widely scattered distribution of dense molecular clumps/cores over the observed ∼10 pc spatial scale. The relatively evolved sources G10.2-0.3 and G10.3-0.1 appear to be affected by stellar feedback, and show a complicated cloud morphology embedded with abundant dense molecular clumps/cores. We find that with the high angular resolution we achieved, our visual classification of cloud morphology can be linked to the systematically derived statistical quantities (i.e., the enclosed mass profile, the column density probability distribution function, the two-point correlation function of column density, and the probability distribution function of clump/core separations). In particular, the massive molecular gas clumps located at the centre of G10.6-0.4 and W49A, which contribute to a considerable fraction of their overall cloud masses, may be special OB cluster-forming environments as a direct consequence of global cloud collapse. These centralized massive molecular gas clumps also uniquely occupy much higher column densities than what is determined by the overall fit of power-law column density probability distribution function. We have made efforts to archive the derived statistical quantities of individual target sources, to permit comparisons with theoretical frameworks, numerical simulations, and other observations in the future.

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