Extended baselines for the IRAM Plateau de Bure interferometer: First results
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The IRAM interferometer, located on the Plateau de Bure at 2500 meters altitude in the French Alps, has entered a new era since the beginning of 2006. The tracks, on which the six 15-meter diameter antennas move, have been extended, nearly doubling the east-west and north-south baselines. The largest separation of the antennas is now 760 meters, enabling sub-arcsecond angular resolution at millimeter wavelengths. This special issue of Astronomy & Astrophysics Letters presents first results with the extended baselines of the Plateau de Bure interferometer. Eleven Letters report observations done at sub-arcsecond resolution of objects ranging from nearby star-forming regions and evolved stars to starburst galaxies.

“Star formation in Perseus. II. SEDs, classification, and lifetimes”, by J. Hatchell et al. A&A 468, p. 1009

Understanding protostellar evolution requires reliable estimates of the time spent in various evolutionary phases and this in turn requires the statistics of the number of accreting protostars relative to pre-main sequence stars and to prestellar cores. This article supplies such estimates for the stars forming in the nearby Perseus molecular cloud.