Herschel observations of a potential core-forming clump: Perseus B1-E

¹ Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Victoria, PO Box 355, STN CSC, Victoria BC, V8W 3P6, Canada
e-mail: ssadavoy@uvic.ca
² National Research Council Canada, Herzberg Institute of Astrophysics, 5071 West Saanich Road, Victoria BC, V9E 2E7, Canada
³ Laboratoire AIM, CEA/DSM-CNRS-Université Paris Diderot, IRFU/Service d’Astrophysique, CEA Saclay, 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette, France
⁴ IAPS – INAF, via del Fosso del Cavaliere, 100, 00133 Roma, Italy
⁵ CNRS, IRAP, 9 Av. colonel Roche, BP 44346, 31028 Toulouse Cedex 4, France
⁶ Université de Toulouse, UPS-OMP, IRAP, 31028 Toulouse Cedex 4, France
⁷ ESO, Karl Schwarzschild-Strasse 2, 87548 Garching bei Munchen, Germany
⁸ School of Physics, University of Exeter, Stocker Road, Exeter EX4 4QL, UK
⁹ Canadian Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, M5S 3H8, Canada
¹⁰ INAF-Osservatorio Astrofisico di Arcetri, Largo E. Fermi 5, 50125 Firenze, Italy
¹¹ The Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Chilton, Didcot OX11 0NL, UK
¹² The Open University, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Milton Keynes MK7 6AA, UK
¹³ Department of Physics and Astronomy, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, L8S 4M1, Canada

Received: 23 August 2011
Accepted: 28 November 2011

Abstract

We present continuum observations of the Perseus B1-E region from the Herschel Gould Belt Survey. These Herschel data reveal a loose grouping of substructures at 160−500 μm not seen in previous submillimetre observations. We measure temperature and column density from these data and select the nine densest and coolest substructures for follow-up spectral line observations with the Green Bank Telescope. We find that the B1-E clump has a mass of  ~100 M_⊙ and appears to be gravitationally bound. Furthermore, of the nine substructures examined here, one substructure (B1-E2) appears to be itself bound. The substructures are typically less than a Jeans length from their nearest neighbour and thus, may interact on a timescale of  ~1 Myr. We propose that B1-E may be forming a first generation of dense cores, which could provide important constraints on the initial conditions of prestellar core formation. Our results suggest that B1-E may be influenced by a strong, localized magnetic field, but further observations are still required.