ALMA Cycle 1 observations of the HH 46/47 molecular outflow: structure, entrainment, and core impact

We present Atacama Large Millimeter/sub-millimeter Array Cycle 1 observations of the HH 46/47 molecular outflow using combined 12 m array and Atacama Compact Array observations. The improved angular resolution and sensitivity of our multi-line maps reveal structures that help us study the entrainment process in much more detail and allow us to obtain more precise estimates of outflow properties than in previous observations. We use ${}^{13}CO$ (1–0) and $C^{18}O$ (1–0) emission to correct for the ${}^{12}CO$ (1–0) optical depth to accurately estimate the outflow mass, momentum, and kinetic energy. This correction increases the estimates of the mass, momentum, and kinetic energy by factors of about 9, 5, and 2, respectively, with respect to estimates assuming optically thin emission. The new ${}^{13}CO$ and $C^{18}O$ data also allow us to trace denser and slower outflow material than that traced by the ${}^{12}CO$ maps, and they reveal an outflow cavity wall at very low velocities (as low as 0.2 ${\text{km s}}^{-1}$ with respect to the core's central velocity). Adding the slower material traced only by ${}^{13}CO$ and $C^{18}O$, there is another factor of three increase in the mass estimate and 50% increase in the momentum estimate. The estimated outflow properties indicate that the outflow is capable of dispersing the parent core within the typical lifetime of the embedded phase of a low-mass protostar and that it is responsible for a core-to-star efficiency of 1/4 to 1/3. We find that the outflow cavity wall is composed of multiple shells associated with a series of jet bow-shock events. Within about 3000 au of the protostar the ${}^{13}CO$ and $C^{18}O$ emission trace a circumstellar envelope with both rotation and infall motions, which we compare with a simple analytic model. The CS (2–1) emission reveals tentative evidence of a slowly moving rotating outflow, which we suggest is entrained not only poloidally but also toroidally by a disk wind that is launched from relatively large radii from the source.