SF-06-0017

Investigating Protostellar Accretion: Resolving the jet and Outflow from a low luminosity protostar IRAS 16253-2429 with JWST

Manoj Puravankara, Mayank Narang, Sam Federman, Tom Megeath, Adam Rubinstein, Dan Watson, Rob Gutermuth, John Tobin, Neal Evans, Ewine Van Dishoeck, and the IPA Team

Investigating Protostellar Accretion (IPA) is a medium-sized cycle 1 GO program targeting five protostars spanning the mass spectrum with NIRSpec IFU and MIRI MRS observations covering 2.9-28 microns. These deeply embedded protostars are in their primary accretion phase and cannot be studied at shorter wavelengths. We present our program's first complete data set: the NIRSpec and MIRI IFU of a low luminosity (0.2 solar luminosity) protostar, IRAS 16253-2429, in the Ophiuchus cloud at a distance of 140 pc. ALMA measurements of the rotation of the surrounding disk show that the central protostar has a mass of 0.1 solar masses, just above the hydrogen burning limit. We focus on the line emission from the jet and outflow launched by this protostar. In particular, we will overview efforts to characterize the jet, primarily seen in atomic and ionic forbidden line emission, and the shocks tracing the impact of the wide-angle wind on the cavity walls, as traced by molecular hydrogen lines.