OH Survey along Sightlines of Galactic Observations of Terahertz C+

Abstract

We have obtained OH spectra of four transitions in the 2Π3/2 ground state, at 1612, 1665, 1667, and 1720 MHz, toward 51 sightlines that were observed in the Herschel project Galactic Observations of Terahertz C+. The observations cover the longitude range of (32°, 64°) and (189°, 207°) in the northern Galactic plane. All of the diffuse OH emissions conform to the so-called "Sum Rule" of the four brightness temperatures, indicating optically thin emission conditions for OH from diffuse clouds in the Galactic plane. The column densities of the H i "halos" N(H i) surrounding molecular clouds increase monotonically with OH column density, N(OH), until saturating when N(H i) = 1.0x10^21 cm^-2 and N(OH) ≤ 4.5 x 10^15 cm^-2, indicating the presence of molecular gas that cannot be traced by H i. Such a linear correlation, albeit weak, is suggestive of H i halos' contribution to the UV shielding required for molecular formation. About 18% of OH clouds have no associated CO emission (CO-dark) at a sensitivity of 0.07 K, but are associated with C+ emission. A weak correlation exists between C+ intensity and OH column density for CO-dark molecular clouds. These results imply that OH seems to be a better tracer of molecular gas than CO in diffuse molecular regions Show more