Mid-IR observations of small stellar clusters surrounding Herbig AeBe stars^*

¹ Osservatorio Astrofisico di Arcetri, INAF, Largo E. Fermi 5, 50125 Firenze, Italy
² European Southern Observatory, Santiago, Chile

Corresponding author: E. Habart, habart@arcetri.astro.it

Received: 23 September 2002
Accepted: 28 November 2002

Abstract

We present TIMMI2 observations at 10 μm of 12 fields centered on known Herbig AeBe (HAeBe) stars. We detected sources (in addition to the HAeBe star) in five fields, three of which are associated with early B stars. Using complementary near-IR and optical data, we estimate that the detected sources are young, embedded (A_V   mag), intermediate-mass objects (~ ). In four objects the 10 μm emission can be accounted for by a circumstellar disk, while in 2 cases (possibly 3) there is evidence that the objects are still in an earlier stage of evolution (Class I). These results confirm the association of the early B Herbig stars with rather rich clusters, as well as their very young age. If our estimates of the stellar parameters are confirmed, this would be the largest sample so far of embedded, intermediate-mass objects available for further studies.