Researchers have created the most detailed maps of the stars, resembling our sun. They provide unprecedented detail of the structure of the molecular cloud of Orion - the nearest area of stellar birth. Orion A interferes with many star-forming environments, including dense star clusters, resembling the place in which the Sun appeared.
Maps explore a wide range of physical scales needed to study how stars form in molecular clouds and how young stellar objects affect their parent cloud. The research team includes astronomers from the USA, Chile, France, Japan, Spain, Germany and the USA. The maps were created by combining the telescope data with a single plate and an interferometer.
The complete data set and maps were named “CARMA-NRO Orion Survey”. The name refers to the combined array for research in millimeter astronomy (CARMA) - an interferometer located in California, and the NRO telescope in Japan.
Maps will allow to calibrate star formation models for extra-galactic research. This is a great help to astronomers who are trying to understand how fast and efficiently stars are created. For example, maps show that the energy emitted by stars with large masses significantly affects the cloud environment.
