摘要：We present a study of the relative orientation between the magnetic field projected onto the plane of sky (B⊥) on scales down to 0.4 pc, inferred from the polarized thermal emission of Galactic dust observed byPlanckat 353 GHz, and the distribution of gas column density (NH) structures on scales down to 0.026 pc, derived from the observations byHerschelin submillimeter wavelengths, toward ten nearby (d< 450 pc) molecular clouds. Using the histogram of relative orientation technique in combination with tools from circular statistics, we found that the mean relative orientation betweenNHandB⊥toward these regions increases progressively from 0°, where theNHstructures lie mostly parallel toB⊥, with increasingNH, in many cases reaching 90°, where theNHstructures lie mostly perpendicular toB⊥. We also compared the relative orientation betweenNHandB⊥and the distribution ofNH, which is characterized by the slope of the tail of theNHprobability density functions (PDFs). We found that the slopes of theNHPDF tail are steepest in regions whereNHandB⊥are close to perpendicular. This coupling between theNHdistribution and the magnetic field suggests that the magnetic fields play a significant role in structuring the interstellar medium in and around molecular clouds. However, we found no evident correlation between the star formation rates, estimated from the counts of young stellar objects, and the relative orientation betweenNHandB⊥in these regions.
关键词：Key wordsenISM: generalISM: magnetic fieldsISM: cloudsdust, extinctionstars: formationsubmillimeter: ISM
