A Census of Star Formation in the Outer Galaxy II: The GLIMPSE360 Field

We have conducted a study of star formation in the outer Galaxy from 65\degr$< l <$265\degr~in the region observed by the GLIMPSE360 program. This {\it Spitzer} warm mission program mapped the plane of the outer Milky Way with IRAC at 3.6 and 4.5~$μ$m. We combine the IRAC, {\it WISE}, and 2MASS catalogs and our previous results from another outer Galaxy survey and identify a total of 47,338 Young Stellar Objects (YSOs) across the field spanning $>$180\degr\ in Galactic longitude. Using the $DBSCAN$ method on the combined catalog, we identify 618 clusters or aggregations of YSOs having 5 or more members. We identify 10,476 Class I, 29,604 Class II, and 7,325 anemic Class II/Class III YSOs. The ratio of YSOs identified as members of clusters was 25,528/47,338, or 54\%. We found 100 of the clusters identified have previously measured distances in the {\it WISE} \ion{H}{2} survey. We used these distances in our spectral energy distribution (SED) fitting of the YSOs in these clusters, of which 96 had YSOs with $<3σ$ fits. We used the derived masses from the SED model fits to estimate the initial mass function (IMF) in the inner and outer Galaxy clusters: dividing the clusters by Galactocentric distances, the slopes were $Γ= 1.87 \pm 0.31$ above 3~M$_{\odot}$ for $R_{Gal} < 11.5$~kpc and $Γ= 1.15 \pm 0.24$ above 3~M$_{\odot}$ for $R_{Gal} > 11.5$~kpc. The slope of the combined IMF was found to be $Γ= 1.92 \pm 0.42$ above 3~M$_{\odot}$. These values are consistent with each other within the uncertainties, and with literature values in the inner Galaxy high-mass star formation regions. The slopes are likely also consistent with a universal Salpeter IMF.

No reviews yet.

No comments yet.