Molecular Gas and the Modest Star Formation Efficiency in the “Antennae” Galaxies: Arp 244 = NGC 4038/9
Bibliographic record
Abstract
We report here a factor of 5.7 higher total CO flux in Arp 244 (the "Antennae" galaxies) than that previously accepted in the literature (thus a total molecular gas mass of 1.5 × 10 10 M ☉ ), based on our fully sampled CO(1-0) observations at the NRAO 12 m telescope. Currently, much of the understanding and modeling of the star formation in Arp 244 has been derived using a much lower molecular gas mass. It is imperative to reconsider everything, as the high molecular gas mass might provide sufficient fuel for ultraluminous extreme starburst in Arp 244 once the merging advances to late stage. Our observations show that the molecular gas peaks predominately in the disk-disk overlap region between the nuclei, similar to the far-infrared (FIR) and mid-infrared (MIR) emission. The bulk of the molecular gas is forming into stars with a normal star formation efficiency (SFE) L IR / M (H 2 ) ≈ 4.2 L ☉ / M ☉ , the same as that of giant molecular clouds in the Galactic disk. Additional supportive evidence is the extremely low fraction of the dense molecular gas in Arp 244, revealed by our detections of the HCN(1-0) emission, which traces the active star-forming gas at density ≳10 4 cm -3 . Using the high-resolution BIMA + NRAO 12 m telescope, full-synthesis CO(1-0) images and our VLA continuum maps at 20 cm, we estimate the local SFE indicated by the ratio map of the radio continuum to CO(1-0) emission, down to kiloparsec scale. Remarkably, the local SFE stays roughly the same over the bulk of the molecular gas distribution. Only some localized regions show the highest radio-to-CO ratios that we have identified as the sites of the most intense starbursts with SFE ≳ 20 L ☉ / M ☉ . Here we have assumed that the 20 cm emission is a fairly good indicator of star formation down to kiloparsec scale in Arp 244 because of the well-known correlation between the FIR and the radio continuum emission. These starburst regions are confined exclusively to the dusty patches seen in the Hubble Space Telescope optical images near the CO and FIR peaks where the violent starbursts are presumably heavily obscured. Nevertheless, recent large-scale star formation is going on throughout the system (e.g., concentrations of numerous super-star clusters and MIR "hotspots"), yet the measured level is more suggestive of a moderate starburst (SFE ≳ 10 L ☉ / M ☉ ) or a weak to normal star formation (SFE ~ 4 L ☉ / M ☉ ), not necessarily occurring at the high concentrations of the molecular gas reservoir. The overall starburst from the bulk of the molecular gas is yet to be initiated as most of the gas further condenses into a kiloparsec scale in the final coalescence.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.003 | 0.001 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".