Dark supernova remnant buried in the Galactic-Centre "Brick" G0.253+0.016 revealed by an expanding CO-line bubble

Abstract

We performed a 12CO and 13CO-line study of the "Brick" (G0.253+0.016) in the Galactic Centre (GC) by analyzing archival data obtained with the Nobeyama 45-m telescope. We present kinematics and molecular gas distributions in the longitude-velocity diagram, and suggest that the Brick is located along the GC Arm I in the central molecular zone (CMZ), which yields a distance from the Sun of 8 kpc and galacto-centric distance of 0.2 kpc. The major and minor-axis diameters of the Brick are $D_x\times D_y=8.4 {\rm pc} \times 4.1 {\rm epc}$ at position angle of $40\deg$ and $130\deg$, respectively, and the scale radius is $r_{\rm brick}=\sqrt{D_x D_y}=2.96$ pc. The molecular mass inferred from the 12CO-line integrated intensity is $M_{\rm bri,xco}\sim 5.1\times 10^4 M_\odot$ for a conversion factor $X_{\rm CO}=1.0\times 10^{20}$ H$_2$ cm$^{-2}$ [K km/s]$^{-1}$. On the other hand, the dynamical (Virial) mass for the measured velocity dispersion of $\sigma_v=10.0 $ km/s is calculated to be $M_{\rm bri,vir}\sim 6.8 \times 10^4M_\odot$, which yields a new conversion factor of $X_{\rm CO} =1.3\times 10^{20}$ H$_2$ cm$^{-2}$ [K km/s]${-1}$. The Brick's center has a cavity surrounded by a spherical molecular bubble of radius $r_{\rm bub}=1.85$ pc and mass $\sim 1.7\times 10^4M_\odot$ expanding at $v_{\rm exp}\simeq 10 $ km/s with kinetic energy of $E_0\sim 1.7\times 10^{49}$ erg. If the bubble is approximated by an adiabatic spherical shock wave, the age is estimated to be $t\sim 2/5 r_{\rm bub}/v_{\rm exp}\sim 7.2\times 10^4$ y. Neither non-thermal radio structures nor thermal radio emission indicative of HII region are found in the archival data from the MeerKAT. We suggest that the molecular bubble will be a dark supernova remnant buried in the Brick, which, therefore, has experienced in the past ($\sim 0.1$ Myr ago) massive-star formation with a supernova explosion.