{"paper":{"title":"The CO-H2 Conversion Factor in Disc Galaxies and Mergers","license":"http://arxiv.org/licenses/nonexclusive-distrib/1.0/","headline":"","cross_cats":["astro-ph.GA"],"primary_cat":"astro-ph.CO","authors_text":"Desika Narayanan (Arizona), Eve C. Ostriker (Maryland), Lars Hernquist (Harvard), Mark Krumholz (UCSC)","submitted_at":"2011-04-20T20:00:06Z","abstract_excerpt":"Relating the observed CO emission from giant molecular clouds (GMCs) to the underlying H2 column density is a long-standing problem in astrophysics. While the Galactic CO-H2 conversion factor (Xco) appears to be reasonably constant, observations indicate that Xco may be depressed in high-surface density starburst environments. Using a multi-scale approach, we investigate the dependence of Xco on the galactic environment in numerical simulations of disc galaxies and galaxy mergers. Xco is proportional to the GMC surface density divided by the integrated CO intensity, Wco, and Wco is related to "},"claims":{"count":0,"items":[],"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57"},"source":{"id":"1104.4118","kind":"arxiv","version":3},"verdict":{"id":null,"model_set":{},"created_at":null,"strongest_claim":"","one_line_summary":"","pipeline_version":null,"weakest_assumption":"","pith_extraction_headline":""},"references":{"count":0,"sample":[],"resolved_work":0,"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57","internal_anchors":0},"formal_canon":{"evidence_count":0,"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57"},"author_claims":{"count":0,"strong_count":0,"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57"},"builder_version":"pith-number-builder-2026-05-17-v1"}