Ubiquitous velocity fluctuations throughout the molecular interstellar medium

Henshaw, Jonathan D.; Kruijssen, J. M. Diederik; Longmore, Steven N.; Riener, Manuel; Leroy, Adam K.; Rosolowsky, Erik; Ginsburg, Adam; Battersby, Cara; Chevance, Melanie; Meidt, Sharon E.; Glover, Simon C. O.; Hughes, Annie; Kainulainen, Jouni; Klessen, Ralf S.; Schinnerer, Eva; Schruba, Andreas; Beuther, Henrik; Bigiel, Frank; Blanc, Guillermo A.; Emsellem, Eric; Henning, Thomas; Herrera, Cynthia N.; Koch, Eric W.; Pety, Jerome; Ragan, Sarah E.; Sun, Jiayi
2020
NATURE ASTRONOMY
DOI
10.1038/s41550-020-1126-z
Statistical analysis of velocity fluctuations in the interstellar medium (ISM) of the Milky Way and NGC 4321 show that the motion of molecular gas over scales ranging from 0.1 to 1,000 pc is similar, and consistent with that generated by a combination of gravity and turbulence. ISM structure at one scale is therefore linked to structure at other scales.