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Ghost of a shell: Magnetic fields of galactic supershell GSH 006 - 15 + 7

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posted on 2023-05-20, 04:27 authored by Thomson, AJM, McClure-Griffiths, NM, Federrath, C, John DickeyJohn Dickey, Carretti, E, Gaensler, BM, Haverkorn, M, Kesteven, MJ, Staveley-Smith, L
We identify a counterpart to a Galactic supershell in diffuse radio polarization, and use this to determine the magnetic fields associated with this object. GSH 006 - 15 + 7 has perturbed the polarized emission at 2.3 GHz, as observed in the S-band Polarization All Sky Survey (S-PASS), acting as a Faraday screen. We model the Faraday rotation over the shell, and produce a map of Faraday depth over the area across it. Such models require information about the polarized emission behind the screen, which we obtain from the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP), scaled from 23 to 2.3 GHz, to estimate the synchrotron background behind GSH 006 - 15 + 7. Using the modelled Faraday thickness, we determine the magnitude and the plane-of-the-sky structure of the line-of-sight magnetic field in the shell. We find a peak line-of-sight field strength of |B|peak = 2.0+0.01-0.7 μG. Our measurement probes weak magnetic fields in a low-density regime (number densities of ∼ 0.4cm-3) of the ISM, thus providing crucial information about the magnetic fields in the partially-ionized phase.

History

Publication title

Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

Volume

479

Issue

4

Pagination

5620-5637

ISSN

0035-8711

Department/School

School of Natural Sciences

Publisher

Blackwell Publishing Ltd

Place of publication

9600 Garsington Rd, Oxford, England, Oxon, Ox4 2Dg

Rights statement

Copyright 2018 The Authors. This article has been accepted for publication in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society ©: 2018 The Authors Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Royal Astronomical Society. All rights reserved.

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