GBT25B-212

The Warm Ionized Medium of the Galactic Bar

Abstract

Although the Galactic bar is a major feature of our Galaxy, there are no conclusive detections of ionized gas in the bar outside of the Galactic center. In prior GBT observations, however, our group identified an ionized gas velocity component using radio recombination line (RRL) observations that is not associated with HII regions. We hypothesize that this component is caused by diffuse ionized gas in the Galactic bar. We here propose to investigate the large- and small-scale structure of this feature using deep RRL observations. These observations will allow us to establish whether the ionized gas component of the Galactic bar extends out of the Galactic center.

This is a resubmission of project 24B-329, in which we observed only a few of the requested positions.

Investigators

Name	Institution
Loren Anderson *	West Virginia University
GBT Operator	Green Bank Observatory
Dana Balser	National Radio Astronomy Observatory
Trey Wenger	Wisconsin at Madison, University of
Tom Bania	Boston University
Matteo Luisi	Westminster College

* indicates the PI