Aperture synthesis observations of individual molecular clouds in M33

Abstract

Aperture synthesis maps of six fields in the nearby spiral galaxy M33 have revealed the presence of a population of molecular clouds whose masses, sizes, velocity widths, and brightness temperatures are similar to Galactic giant molecular clouds. The masses of the clouds obtained from the virial theorem and from the integrated CO flux are in relatively good agreement, suggesting that the conversion factor from CO flux to molecular mass in M33 is unlikely to be much different from the value measured in our own Galaxy. The star formation properties of these regions are under study with deep optical CCD imaging and near-infrared data.