Al Wootten

Scientist at NRAO; Research Professor of Astronomy at the University of Virginia

Office: Rm. 313, Stone Hall, The University of Virginia

E-mail (Internet): awootten at nrao.edu


I study emission from molecules in interstellar clouds forming stars, as well as in the outer shells of evolved stars which are returning their stuff to the interstellar medium. The image above shows molecules and dust near the very young object VLA1623. Yellow-green shows the dust emission at a wavelength of 1.3mm taken at the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope on Mauna Kea (next to the Caltech Submillimeter Observatory ) by Andre. Dust and gas accrete onto the young star on scales too small to image until the Atacama Large Millimeter Array is built. Gravitational energy powers jets flying from the poles of the protostar, which push aside ambient gas. Blue delineates blushifted gas, in this case CO molecules, shot from the poles of the dust-enshrouded young star while red delineates redshifted CO emission, as imaged by the IRAM 30m telescope. The protostar has accumulated less than a solar mass so far, to shine with less than one solar luminosity at the 160pc distance to the source. The complex dynamics of the region can be noted in the image of the Rho Ophiuchi Molecular Cloud made by Gary Fuller and myself on the (late and lamented) NRAO 12m radiotelescope , in an image created by Dave Copeland. VLA1623 lies in the colorful northwest part of this image, which is color coded by velocity. Data courtesy of Philippe Andre; I superposed them to form the image above. For recent research on star formation, please see The Star Formation Newsletter edited by Bo Reipurth. For more images illustrating areas of my research, check out my science page. For a primer, visit molecular astrophysics .

I ran NRAO's Summer Student Research Program.


Publications and other diversions
For a study of the constellation Cancer, I brought home some crabs to utilize as finding charts at Slacktide, my home on Sturgeon Creek at the Rappahannock in Deltaville, Va. A finding chart will guide you right to me!.



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awootten at nrao.eduLast updated 27 Apr-04.