Cold gas outflows from the Small Magellanic Cloud traced with ASKAP

N. M. McClure-Griffiths, H. Dénes, J. M. Dickey, S. Stanimirović, L. Staveley-Smith, Katherine Jameson, Enrico Di Teodoro, James R. Allison, J. D. Collier, A. P. Chippendale, T. Franzen, Gülay Gürkan, G. Heald, A. Hotan, D. Kleiner, K. Lee-Waddell, D. McConnell, A. Popping, Jonghwan Rhee, C. J. RiseleyM. A. Voronkov, M. Whiting

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

46 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Feedback from massive stars plays a critical part in the evolution of the Universe by driving powerful outflows from galaxies that enrich the intergalactic medium and regulate star formation. An important source of outflows may be the most numerous galaxies in the Universe: dwarf galaxies. With small gravitational potential wells, these galaxies easily lose their star-forming material in the presence of intense stellar feedback. Here, we show that a nearby dwarf galaxy — the Small Magellanic Cloud — has atomic hydrogen outflows extending at least 2 kiloparsecs from the star-forming bar of the galaxy. The outflows are cold (< 400 K) and may have formed during a period of active star formation 25–60 Myr ago. The total mass of atomic gas in the outflow is about 107 solar masses (that is, about 3 per cent of the total atomic gas of the galaxy). The inferred mass flux in atomic gas alone, M˙HIM˙HI  ≈ 0.2–1.0 solar masses per year, is up to one order of magnitude greater than the star-formation rate. We suggest that most of the observed outflow will be stripped from the Small Magellanic Cloud through its interaction with its companion, the Large Magellanic Cloud, and the Milky Way, feeding the Magellanic Stream of hydrogen encircling the Milky Way.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)901-906
Number of pages6
JournalNature Astronomy
Volume2
Issue number11
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2018

Keywords

  • Magellanic Clouds
  • bipolar outflows (astrophysics)
  • dwarf galaxies
  • galaxies
  • supergiant stars

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Cold gas outflows from the Small Magellanic Cloud traced with ASKAP'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this