Letter to the Editor

The Aquila prestellar core population revealed by Herschel ^*,**

¹ Laboratoire AIM, CEA/DSM–CNRS–Université Paris Diderot, IRFU/Service d'Astrophysique, C.E. Saclay, Orme des Merisiers, 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette, France e-mail: vera.konyves@cea.fr
² CNRS/INSU, Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de Bordeaux, UMR 5804, BP 89, 33271 Floirac cedex, France
³ Université de Bordeaux, OASU, Bordeaux, France
⁴ European Southern Observatory, Karl Schwarzschild Str. 2, 85748 Garching bei München, Germany
⁵ IAS, CNRS/INSU–Université Paris-Sud, 91435 Orsay, France
⁶ Infrared Processing and Analysis Center, MC 100-22, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
⁷ Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de Marseille, CNRS/INSU–Université de Provence, 13388 Marseille cedex 13, France
⁸ CESR & UMR 5187 du CNRS/Université de Toulouse, BP 4346, 31028 Toulouse cedex 4, France
⁹ Observatoire Astronomique de Strasbourg, UMR 7550 CNRS/Université de Strasbourg, 11 rue de l'Université, 67000, Strasbourg, France
¹⁰ IRAM, 300 rue de la Piscine, Domaine Universitaire, 38406 Saint Martin d'Hères, France
¹¹ National Research Council of Canada, Herzberg Institute of Astrophysics, University of Victoria, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Victoria, Canada 

¹² INAF-IFSI, Fosso del Cavaliere 100, 00133 Roma, Italy
¹³ School of Physics and Astronomy, Cardiff University, Queens Buildings, The Parade, Cardiff CF24 3AA, UK
¹⁴ National Astronomical Observatories, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100012, China
¹⁵ Canadian Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON M5S 3H8, Canada
¹⁶ Department of Astronomy, Stockholm Observatoty, AlbaNova University Center, Roslagstullsbacken 21, 10691 Stockholm, Sweden
¹⁷ Institute d'Astrophysique de Paris, UMR 7095 CNRS, Université Pierre et Marie Curie, 98 bis Boulevard Arago, 75014 Paris, France
¹⁸ UK Astronomy Technology Centre, Royal Observatory Edinburgh, Blackford Hill, Edinburgh EH9 3HJ, UK
¹⁹ INAF - Osservatorio Astrofisico di Arcetri, Largo Fermi 5, 50125 Firenze, Italy
²⁰ The Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Chilton, Didcot OX11 0NL, UK
²¹ Department of Physics and Astronomy, The Open University, Walton Hall, Milton Keynes MK7 6AA, UK
²² Department of Physics and Astronomy, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON L8S 4M1, Canada

Received: 31 March 2010
Accepted: 2 May 2010

Abstract

The origin and possible universality of the stellar initial mass function (IMF) is a major issue in astrophysics. One of the main objectives of the Herschel Gould Belt Survey is to clarify the link between the prestellar core mass function (CMF) and the IMF. We present and discuss the core mass function derived from Herschel data for the large population of prestellar cores discovered with SPIRE and PACS in the Aquila rift cloud complex at d ~ 260 pc. We detect a total of 541 starless cores in the entire ~11 deg² area of the field imaged at 70–500 μm with SPIRE/PACS. Most of these cores appear to be gravitationally bound, and thus prestellar in nature. Our Herschel results confirm that the shape of the prestellar CMF resembles the stellar IMF, with much higher quality statistics than earlier submillimeter continuum ground-based surveys.