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M. J. Reid

Publications and source records attributed to M. J. Reid.

At least 91 records · Page 5Linked to original sources

Simultaneous Multi-Wavelength Observations of Sgr A* during 2007 April 1-11

We report the detection of variable emission from Sgr A* in almost all wavelength bands (i.e. centimeter, millimeter, submillimeter, near-IR and X-rays) during a multi-wavelength observing campaign. Three new moderate flares are detected simultaneously in both near-IR and X-ray bands. The ratio of X-ray to near-IR flux in the flares is consistent with inverse Compton scattering of near-IR photons by submillimeter emitting relativistic particles which follow scaling relations obtained from size measurements of Sgr A*. We also find that the flare statistics in near-IR wavelengths is consistent with the probability of flare emission being inversely proportional to the flux. At millimeter wavelengths, the presence of flare emission at 43 GHz (7mm) using VLBA with milli-arcsecond spatial resolution indicates the first direct evidence that hourly time scale flares are localized within the inner 30$\times$70 Schwarzschild radii of Sgr A*. We also show several cross correlation plots between near-IR, millimeter and submillimeter light curves that collectively demonstrate the presence of time delays between the peaks of emission up to three hours. The evidence for time delays at millimeter and submillimeter wavelengths are consistent with the source of emission being optically thick initially followed by a transition to an optically thin regime. In particular, there is an intriguing correlation between the optically thin near-IR and X-ray flare and optically thick radio flare at 43 GHz that occurred on 2007 April 4. This would be the first evidence of a radio flare emission at 43 GHz delayed with respect to the near-IR and X-ray flare emission.

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A Trigonometric Parallax of Sgr B2

We have measured the positions of water masers in Sgr B2, a massive star forming region in the Galactic center, relative to an extragalactic radio source with the Very Long Baseline Array. The positions measured at 12 epochs over a time span of one year yield the trigonometric parallax of Sgr B2 and hence a distance to the Galactic center of Ro=7.9 (+0.8/-0.7) kpc. The proper motion of Sgr B2 relative to Sgr A* suggests that Sgr B2 is about 0.13 kpc nearer than the Galactic center, assuming a low-eccentricity Galactic orbit.

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Discovery of a bright radio transient in M82: a new radio supernova?

In this Letter, we report the discovery of a new bright radio transient in M82. Using the Very Large Array, we observed the nuclear region of M82 at several epochs at 22 GHz and detected a new bright radio source in this galaxy's central region. We find a flux density for this flaring source that is ~300 times larger than upper limits determined in previous observations. The flare must have started between 2007 October 29 and 2008 March 24. Over the last year, the flux density of this new source has decreased from ~100 mJy to ~11 mJy. The lightcurve (based on only three data points) can be fitted better with an exponential decay than with a power law. Based on the current data we cannot identify the nature of this transient source. However, a new radio supernova seems to be the most natural explanation. With it's flux density of more than 100 mJy, it is at least 1.5 times brighter than SN1993J in M81 at the peak of its lightcurve at 22 GHz.

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Trigonometric Parallaxes of Massive Star Forming Regions: VI. Galactic Structure, Fundamental Parameters and Non-Circular Motions

We are using the VLBA and the Japanese VERA project to measure trigonometric parallaxes and proper motions of masers found in high-mass star-forming regions across the Milky Way. Early results from 18 sources locate several spiral arms. The Perseus spiral arm has a pitch angle of 16 +/- 3 degrees, which favors four rather than two spiral arms for the Galaxy. Combining positions, distances, proper motions, and radial velocities yields complete 3-dimensional kinematic information. We find that star forming regions on average are orbiting the Galaxy ~15 km/s slower than expected for circular orbits. By fitting the measurements to a model of the Galaxy, we estimate the distance to the Galactic center R_o = 8.4 +/- 0.6 kpc and a circular rotation speed Theta_o = 254 +/- 16 km/s. The ratio Theta_o/R_o can be determined to higher accuracy than either parameter individually, and we find it to be 30.3 +/- 0.9 km/s/kpc, in good agreement with the angular rotation rate determined from the proper motion of Sgr A*. The data favor a rotation curve for the Galaxy that is nearly flat or slightly rising with Galactocentric distance. Kinematic distances are generally too large, sometimes by factors greater than two; they can be brought into better agreement with the trigonometric parallaxes by increasing Theta_o/R_o from the IAU recommended value of 25.9 km/s/kpc to a value near 30 km/s/kpc. We offer a "revised" prescription for calculating kinematic distances and their uncertainties, as well as a new approach for defining Galactic coordinates. Finally, our estimates of Theta_o and To/R_o, when coupled with direct estimates of R_o, provide evidence that the rotation curve of the Milky Way is similar to that of the Andromeda galaxy, suggesting that the dark matter halos of these two dominant Local Group galaxy are comparably massive.

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Evidence for Warped Disks of Young Stars in the Galactic Center

The central parsec around the super-massive black hole in the Galactic Center hosts more than 100 young and massive stars. Outside the central cusp (R~1") the majority of these O and Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars reside in a main clockwise system, plus a second, less prominent disk or streamer system at large angles with respect to the main system. Here we present the results from new observations of the Galactic Center with the AO-assisted near-infrared imager NACO and the integral field spectrograph SINFONI on the ESO/VLT. These include the detection of 27 new reliably measured WR/O stars in the central 12" and improved measurements of 63 previously detected stars, with proper motion uncertainties reduced by a factor of four compared to our earlier work. We develop a detailed statistical analysis of their orbital properties and orientations. Half of the WR/O stars are compatible with being members of a clockwise rotating system. The rotation axis of this system shows a strong transition as a function of the projected distance from SgrA*. The main clockwise system either is either a strongly warped single disk with a thickness of about 10 degrees, or consists of a series of streamers with significant radial variation in their orbital planes. 11 out of 61 clockwise moving stars have an angular separation of more than 30 degrees from the clockwise system. The mean eccentricity of the clockwise system is 0.36+/-0.06. The distribution of the counter-clockwise WR/O star is not isotropic at the 98% confidence level. It is compatible with a coherent structure such as stellar filaments, streams, small clusters or possibly a disk in a dissolving state. The observed disk warp and the steep surface density distribution favor in situ star formation in gaseous accretion disks as the origin of the young stars.

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Structure and Dynamics of the Milky Way: an Astro2010 Science White Paper

Recent advances in radio astrometry with the VLBA have resulted in near micro-arcsecond accurate trigonometric parallax and proper motion measurements for masers in star forming regions. We are now poised to directly measure the full 3-dimensional locations and motions of every massive star forming region in the Milky Way and for the first time to map its spiral structure. Such measurements would also yield the full kinematics of the Milky Way and determine its fundamental parameters (Ro and To) with 1% accuracy. Coupled with other observations this would yield the distribution of mass among the various components (including dark matter) of the Milky Way.

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Motions of Galaxies in the Local Group and Beyond: an Astro2010 Science White Paper

Recent advances with the VLBA have resulted in ~10 micro-arcsec astrometry for compact sources in external galaxies, and measurement of the proper motion of Local Group galaxies has been demonstrated. With improved telescopes and equipment, we could greatly improve upon and expand these measurements, including a measurement of the proper motion of the Andromeda galaxy, which is key to understanding the history and fate of the Local Group. The combination of optical velocities and radio astrometric data would allow detailed modeling of the mass distributions of the disks, bulges, and dark matter halos of galaxies in clusters.

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CO in OH/IR stars close to the Galactic centre

Aims: A pilot project has been carried out to measure circumstellar CO emission from three OH/IR stars close to the Galactic centre. The intention was to find out whether it would be possible to conduct a large-scale survey for mass-loss rates using, for example, the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA). Such a survey would increase our understanding of the evolution of the Galactic bulge. Methods: Two millimetre-wave instruments were used: the Nobeyama Millimeter Array at 115 GHz and the Submillimeter Array at 230 GHz. An interferometer is necessary as a `spatial filter' in this region of space because of the confusion with interstellar CO emission. Results: Towards two of the stars, CO emission was detected with positions and radial velocities coinciding within the statistical errors with the corresponding data of the associated OH sources. However, for one of the stars the line profile is not what one expects for an unresolved expanding circumstellar envelope. We believe that this CO envelope is partially resolved and that this star therefore is a foreground star not belonging to the bulge. Conclusions: The results of the observations have shown that it is possible to detect line profiles of circumstellar CO from late-type stars both within and in the direction of the Galactic bulge. ALMA will be able to detect CO emission in short integrations with sensitivity sufficient to estimate mass-loss rates from a large number of such stars.

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Evidence of a pure starburst nature of the nuclear region of NGC 253

We present high-resolution spectral line and continuum VLBI and VLA observations of the nuclear region of NGC 253 at 22 GHz. While the water vapor masers in this region were detected on arcsecond and milliarcsecond scales, we could not detect any compact continuum emission with a 5 sigma upper limit of ~ 1 mJy. The observations reveal that the water maser emission is not related to a possible low-luminosity active galactic nucleus but is almost certainly associated with star-formation activity. Not detecting any compact continuum source on milliarcsecond scales also questions the presence of a - previously assumed - active nucleus in NGC 253.

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The distance to a star forming region in the Outer arm of the Galaxy

We performed astrometric observations with the VLBA of WB89-437, an H2O maser source in the Outer spiral arm of the Galaxy. We measure an annual parallax of 0.167 +/- 0.006 mas, corresponding to a heliocentric distance of 6.0 +/- 0.2 kpc or a Galactocentric distance of 13.4 +/- 0.2 kpc. This value for the heliocentric distance is considerably smaller than the kinematic distance of 8.6 kpc. This confirms the presence of a faint Outer arm toward l = 135 degrees. We also measured the full space motion of the object and find a large peculiar motion of ~20 km/s toward the Galactic center. This peculiar motion explains the large error in the kinematic distance estimate. We also find that WB89-437 has the same rotation speed as the LSR, providing more evidence for a flat rotation curve and thus the presence of dark matter in the outer Galaxy.

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Distances to Galactic methanol masers

We present the first EVN parallax measurements of 6.7 GHz methanol masers in star forming regions of the Galaxy. The 6.7 GHz methanol maser transition is a very valuable astrometric tool, for its large stability and confined velocity spread, which makes it ideal to measure proper motions and parallaxes. Eight well-studied massive star forming regions have been observed during five EVN sessions of 24 hours duration each and we present here preliminary results for five of them. We achieve accuracies of up to 51 $μ$as, which still have the potential to be proved by more ideal observational circumstances.

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The Megamaser Cosmology Project: I. VLBI observations of UGC 3789

The Megamaser Cosmology Project (MCP) seeks to measure the Hubble Constant (Ho) in order to improve the extragalactic distance scale and constrain the nature of dark energy. We are searching for sources of water maser emission from AGN with sub-pc accretion disks, as in NGC 4258, and following up these discoveries with Very Long Baseline Interferometric (VLBI) imaging and spectral monitoring. Here we present a VLBI map of the water masers toward UGC 3789, a galaxy well into the Hubble Flow. We have observed masers moving at rotational speeds up to 800 km/s at radii as small as 0.08 pc. Our map reveals masers in a nearly edge-on disk in Keplerian rotation about a 10^7 Msun supermassive black hole. When combined with centripetal accelerations, obtained by observing spectral drifts of maser features (to be presented in Paper II), the UGC 3789 masers may provide an accurate determination of Ho, independent of luminosities and metallicity and extinction corrections.

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Trigonometric Parallaxes of Massive Star Forming Regions: II. Cep A & NGC 7538

We report trigonometric parallaxes for the sources NGC 7538 and Cep A, corresponding to distances of 2.65 [+0.12/-0.11] kpc and 0.70 [+0.04/-0.04] kpc, respectively. The distance to NGC 7538 is considerably smaller than its kinematic distance and places it in the Perseus spiral arm. The distance to Cep A is also smaller than its kinematic distance and places it in the Local arm or spur. Combining the distance and proper motions with observed radial velocities gives the location and full space motion of the star forming regions. We find significant deviations from circular Galactic orbits for these sources: both sources show large peculiar motions (> 10 km/s) counter to Galactic rotation and NGC 7538 has a comparable peculiar motion toward the Galactic center.

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Trigonometric Parallaxes of Massive Star Forming Regions: III. G59.7+0.1 and W 51 IRS2

We report trigonometric parallaxes for G59.7+0.1 and W 51 IRS2, corresponding to distances of 2.16^{+0.10}_{-0.09} kpc and 5.1^{+2.9}_{-1.4} kpc, respectively. The distance to G59.7+0.1 is smaller than its near kinematic distance and places it between the Carina-Sagittarius and Perseus spiral arms, probably in the Local (Orion) spur. The distance to W 51 IRS2, while subject to significant uncertainty, is close to its kinematic distance and places it near the tangent point of the Carina-Sagittarius arm. It also agrees well with a recent estimate based on O-type star spectro/photometry. Combining the distances and proper motions with observed radial velocities gives the full space motions of the star forming regions. We find modest deviations of 5 to 10 km/s from circular Galactic orbits for these sources, both counter to Galactic rotation and toward the Galactic center.

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Trigonometric Parallaxes of Massive Star Forming Regions: IV. G35.20-0.74 and G35.20-1.74

We report trigonometric parallaxes for the high-mass star forming regions G35.20-0.74 and G35.20-1.74, corresponding to distances of 2.19 (+0.24 -0.20) kpc and 3.27 (+0.56 -0.42) kpc, respectively. The distances to both sources are close to their near kinematic distances and place them in the Carina-Sagittarius spiral arm. Combining the distances and proper motions with observed radial velocities gives the locations and full space motions of the star forming regions. Assuming a standard model of the Galaxy, G35.20-0.74 and G35.20-1.74 have peculiar motions of ~13 km/s and ~16 km/s counter to Galactic rotation and ~9 km/s toward the North Galactic Pole.

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Trigonometric Parallaxes of Massive Star Forming Regions: V. G23.01-0.41 and G23.44-0.18

We report trigonometric parallaxes for the massive star-forming regions G23.01-0.41 and G23.44-0.18, corresponding to distances of 4.59 [+0.38/-0.33] kpc and 5.88 [+1.37/-0.93] kpc, respectively. The distance to G23.01-0.41 is smaller than its near kinematic distance assuming a standard model of the Milky Way and less than half of its far kinematic distance, which has usually been assumed. This places it in the Crux-Scutum spiral arm. The distance to G23.44-0.18 is close to its near kinematic distance and most likely places it in the Norma spiral arm near the end of the Galactic bar. Combining the distance and proper motions with observed radial velocities gives the location and full space motion of the star forming regions. We find large deviations from circular Galactic orbits for these sources: both sources show peculiar motions of 20 to 30 km/s counter to Galactic rotation and toward the Galactic center. These large peculiar motions might be the result of gravitational perturbations from the Galactic bar.

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Trigonometric Parallaxes of Massive Star Forming Regions: I. S 252 & G232.6+1.0

We are conducting a large program with the NRAO Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) to measure trigonometric parallaxes of massive star-forming regions across the Milky Way. Here we report measurement of the parallax and proper motion of methanol masers in S 252 and G232.6+1.0. The parallax of S 252 is 0.476 +/- 0.006 mas (2.10 [+0.027/-0.026] kpc), placing it in the Perseus spiral arm. The parallax of G232.6+1.0 is 0.596 +/- 0.035 mas (1.68 [+0.11/-0.09] kpc), placing it between the Carina-Sagittarius and Perseus arms, possibly in a Local (Orion) spur of the Carina-Sagittarius arm. For both sources, kinematic distances are significantly greater than their parallax distances. Our parallaxes and proper motions yield full space motions accurate to about 1 km/s. Both sources orbit the Galaxy about 13 km/s slower than circular rotation.

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Submillimeter water and ammonia absorption by the peculiar z~0.89 interstellar medium in the gravitational lens of the PKS 1830-211 system

Using the Atacama Pathfinder Experiment (APEX) telescope we have detected the rotational ground-state transitions of ortho-ammonia and ortho-water toward the redshift ~0.89 absorbing galaxy in the PKS 1830-211 gravitational lens system. We discuss our observations in the context of recent space-borne data obtained for these lines with the SWAS and Odin satellites toward Galactic sources. We find commonalities, but also significant differences between the interstellar media in a galaxy at intermediate redshift and in the Milky Way. Future high-quality observations of the ground-state ammonia transition in PKS 1830-211, together with inversion line data, will lead to strong constraints on the variation of the proton to electron mass ratio over the past 7.2 Gyr.

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