A photodissociation region study of NGC 4038

• Published in: Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Vol. 443; no. 1; pp. 111 - 121
• Main Authors: Bisbas, T. G., Bell, T. A., Viti, S., Barlow, M. J., Yates, J., Vasta, M.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Oxford University Press 01.09.2014
• Subjects: Hydrogen; Milky Way; Simulation; Star & galaxy formation; Ultraviolet astronomy; photodissociation region (PDR); methods: numerical; astrochemistry; radiative transfer; galaxies: ISM
• ISSN: 0035-8711; 1365-2966
• DOI: 10.1093/mnras/stu1143

We present a model of the photodissociation regions of NGC 4038, which is part of the Antennae galaxies. We have considered one-dimensional slabs of uniform density, all having a maximum A V = 10 mag, interacting with plane-parallel radiation. The density range in our simulations spans four orders of magnitude (100 ≤ n ≤ 106 cm−3) and the UV field strength spans more than three orders of magnitude (10 ≤ χ ≤ 104.5 multiples of the Draine field), from which we generated a grid of about 1400 simulations. We compare our results with Herschel SPIRE-FTS, CSO and ISO-LWS observations of eight CO transition lines (J = 1-0 to 8-7) and the [C i] 609 μm and [O i] 146 μm fine-structure lines. We find that the molecular and atomic emission lines trace different gas components of NGC 4038; thus, single emission models are insufficient to reproduce the observed values. In general, low-J CO transition lines correspond to either low-density regions interacting with low UV field strengths, or high-density regions interacting with high UV field strengths. Higher J CO transition lines are less dependent on the UV field strength and are fitted by gas with density n ∼ 104.5-105.2 cm− 3. We find that the observed fine-structure line ratio of [C i] 609 μm/[O i] 146 μm is reproduced by clouds subject to weaker UV fields compared to the CO lines. We make estimates of the X CO factor which relates the CO emission with the column density of molecular hydrogen, and find that it is less than the canonical Milky Way value.