ALMA Observations of DEM L241/LMC P3 in the Large Magellanic Cloud: Evidence for the Formation of Cool Molecular Jets Driven by a Microquasar

@article{fukui2026alma,
  title = {{ALMA Observations of DEM L241/LMC P3 in the Large Magellanic Cloud: Evidence for the Formation of Cool Molecular Jets Driven by a Microquasar}},
  author = {Yasuo Fukui and Bhuvana G. R. and Hidetoshi Sano and Kisetsu Tsuge and Rami Z. E. Alsaberi and Rin Yamada and Yuya Asano and Aya Bamba and Miroslav Filipovic and Charles Law and Norikazu Mizuno and Toshikazu Onishi and Paul Plucinsky and Gavin Rowell and Manami Sasaki and Piyush Sharda and Hiromasa Suzuki and Kengo Tachihara and Kazuki Tokuda and Yumiko Yamane},
  journal = {The Astrophysical Journal Letters},
  year = {2026},
  month = oct,
  doi = {10.3847/2041-8213/aea0cb},
  url = {https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/aea0cb},
  note = {CC BY 4.0},
}

TY  - JOUR
TI  - ALMA Observations of DEM L241/LMC P3 in the Large Magellanic Cloud: Evidence for the Formation of Cool Molecular Jets Driven by a Microquasar
AU  - Yasuo Fukui
AU  - Bhuvana G. R.
AU  - Hidetoshi Sano
AU  - Kisetsu Tsuge
AU  - Rami Z. E. Alsaberi
AU  - Rin Yamada
AU  - Yuya Asano
AU  - Aya Bamba
AU  - Miroslav Filipovic
AU  - Charles Law
AU  - Norikazu Mizuno
AU  - Toshikazu Onishi
AU  - Paul Plucinsky
AU  - Gavin Rowell
AU  - Manami Sasaki
AU  - Piyush Sharda
AU  - Hiromasa Suzuki
AU  - Kengo Tachihara
AU  - Kazuki Tokuda
AU  - Yumiko Yamane
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/10/29
JO  - The Astrophysical Journal Letters
DO  - 10.3847/2041-8213/aea0cb
UR  - https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/aea0cb
AB  - We present ALMA observations of DEML 241/LMC P3, the most luminous γ -ray binary consisting of a compact object and an O star, in CO emission. We have found a one-sided jet-like CO feature of 8 pc length and 1 pc width, which accompanies another weaker CO jet candidate with slightly different orientation. The one-sided CO jet exhibits striking alignment with LMC P3, suggesting that the jet was driven by LMC P3. We have determined the kinetic temperature of the CO jet to be significantly high at 33−60 K as compared with ∼15 K in the nearby nonjet CO cloud, where no radiative heat source is found. We interpret that the high temperatures are due to shock heating of a microquasar jet driven by the γ -ray binary, where the compact object has an accretion disk fed by the O star winds. The CO jet matches existing predictions from magnetohydrodynamical simulations, which show that CO jet can form from the interaction of the microquasar jet and an ambient interstellar medium (ISM) cloud. These results provide strong evidence that CO jets are a signature sculpted by microquasar jets, lending support for mass accretion in LMC P3 as the γ -ray origin. The results suggest a second case of CO jets potentially driven by a microquasar along with the CO jets in the microquasar candidate HESS J1023-575 recently identified in the Milky Way. Furthermore, our results suggest the use of submillimeter observations for identifying microquasars, opening a new possible window for their discovery and study.
SN  - 2041-8213
SN  - 2041-8205
ER  -