Spitzer Space Telescope - Archive Research Proposal #20745


Digging faint young stellar objects in molecular clouds by comparing
the YSO-poor SWIRE data and YSO-rich embedded young clusters

Principal Investigator: Shih-Ping  Lai
           Institution: University of Maryland

Co-Investigators: 
Lee Mundy, University of Maryland                                     
Neal Evans, University of Texas                                       
Lori Allen, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics               
Paul Harvey, University of Texas                                      
Nicholas Chapman, University of Maryland                              

Science Category: Star Formation 
Dollars Approved: 21000.0 

Abstract:
We propose to process the data of the SWIRE Legacy Project and seven
selected embedded young clusters observed by GTO programs with the
data reduction pipeline used by the c2d Legacy Project.  The c2d
Legacy Project aims to produce catalogs with large numbers of YSOs for
an unbiased statistical study of stellar contents in the molecular
clouds and statistical lifetime of YSOs at different evolutionary
stages.  To achieve this goal, it is essential to correctly identify
YSOs and their evolutionary status.However, because of the high
sensitivity of the Spitzer Space Telescope, the detected amount of
background galaxies are not negligible in the molecular clouds
observed by the c2d projects.  Furthermore, galaxies and faint YSOs
are virtually indistinguishable in the IRAC color-color diagrams and
color-magnitude diagrams at the faint end.  The analysis we propose
will provide valuable information for the nature of YSOs and galaxies
and the knowledge will be critical for complete understanding of the
initial mass functions in the molecular clouds.