Large-scale structure of molecular gas in Heiles Cloud 2: a remarkable rotating ring

We have mapped the J = 1 --> 0 transition of 13CO over a 3 deg2 region in Heiles Cloud 2 using the Five College Radio Astronomy Observatory 14 m telescope. The complete map contains 3600 individual spectra of which 2400 were sampled with 1' spacing. The map suggest that the structure of Heiles Cloud 2 is dominated by a quasi equilibrium rotating ring similar to those found in numerical calculations of the gravitational collapse of a rotating cloud. Within this ring, several dense condensations have been identified and partially mapped in C18O. These subcondensations, among which is the dense filament TMC-1, probably result from the instability of the ring to fragmentation and have masses on the order of the Jeans mass. Thus, they are marginally unstable to further collapse and may be the precursors of fragments that will eventually form stars.