Astron. Astrophys. 326, 318-328 (1997)

A 200 km s^-1 molecular wind in the peculiar carbon star V Hya

G.R. Knapp ¹, A. Jorissen ^{1 *} and K. Young <sup>2

1</sup> Department of Astrophysical Sciences, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, USA (gk@astro.princeton.edu, ajorisse@astro.ulb.ac.be)
² Caltech Submillimeter Observatory, P.O. Box 4339, Hilo, HI 96720, USA (rtm@dolson.harvard.edu)

Received 12 November 1996 / Accepted 1 April 1997

Abstract

A molecular wind with an outflow speed in excess of 200 has been found in the AGB carbon star V Hya. Observations of several molecular lines show that the circumstellar envelope is expanding at 15 and is flattened and inclined to the line of sight. The fast wind appears to be expanding from the poles of the envelope, with the expansion speed increasing with distance from the star. V Hya may be in the very earliest stage of evolution beyond the AGB.

Key words: stars: carbon stars: individual stars: mass-loss stars: AGB and post-AGB

* On leave from Institut d'Astronomie et d'Astrophysique, Université Libre de Bruxelles

Present address: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, 60 Garden St., Cambridge, MA 02138

SIMBAD Objects

Contents

• 1. Introduction
• 2. Molecular Line Observations
• 3. Circumstellar gas and dust
  • 3.1. The mass of the circumstellar shell
  • 3.2. The circumstellar dust shell
• 4. Discussion
• 5. Conclusions
• Acknowledgements
• References

© European Southern Observatory (ESO) 1997

Online publication: April 20, 1998
helpdesk.link@springer.de