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Session 7 - Molecular Clouds.
Display session, Wednesday, January 07
Exhibit Hall,
The core of OMC--1 has been imaged with NICMOS on the Hubble Space Telescope at 0.2'' resolution in 1% filters at 2.12 and 2.15\mum, revealing intricate structures in both continuum and shocked molecular hydrogen line emission. Numerous H_2-emitting clumps surrounding the BN/KL region have been resolved for the first time, several of which exhibit prototypical bow-shock morphologies with V-shaped tips. We interpret these to be lower-excitation analogs of similar structures \sim 2' NW of the core observed with ground based telescopes. Many of the elongated H_2 structures and bow-shock features appear to radiate outward from a region within a few arcseconds of radio source `I', suggesting that the H_2 energetics are dominated by one or more outflow sources in this region. However, the orientations of some features are unrelated to this apparent outflow pattern. The deeply embedded, suspected outflow source `I' remain s undetected at 2 \mum, although two faint new continuum sources have be en detected within \sim1'' of it. The newly resolved H_2 features with bow-shock morphologies are located in regions previously identified as bow-shocks by highly blueshifted components in their line profiles. Several continuum features have an arc-like appearance, suggesting interactions of winds with the ambient medium. At least 40 stellar or protostellar continuum sources have been detected, including at least one proplyd and four pairs of binary stars.
