YSO jets in the Galactic Plane from UWISH2: IV - Jets and outflows in Cygnus-X

We have performed an unbiased search for outflows from young stars in Cygnus-X using 42 deg$^2$ of data from the UKIRT Widefield Infrared Survey for H$_2$ (UWISH2 survey), to identify shock-excited near-IR H$_2$ emission in the 1$-$0 S(1) 2.122 $\mu$m line. We uncovered 572 outflows, of which 465 are new discoveries, increasing the number of known objects by more than 430%. This large and unbiased sample allows us to statistically determine the typical properties of outflows from young stars. We found 261 bipolar outflows and 16% of these are parsec-scale. The typical bipolar outflow is 0.45pc in length and has gaps of 0.025 to 0.1pc between large knots. The median luminosity in the 1$-$0 S(1) line is 10$^{-3}$ L$_{\odot}$. The bipolar flows are typically asymmetrical, with the two lobes misaligned by 5$^{\circ}$, one lobe 30% shorter than the other, and one lobe twice as bright as the other. Of the remaining outflows, 152 are single-sided and 159 are groups of extended, shock-excited H$_2$ emission without identifiable driving sources. Half of all driving sources have sufficient WISE data to determine their evolutionary status as either protostars (80%) or classical T-Tauri stars (20%). One fifth of the driving sources are variable by more than 0.5mag in the K-band continuum over several years. Several of the newly-identified outflows provide excellent targets for follow up studies. We particularly encourage the study of the outflows and young stars identified in a bright-rimmed cloud near IRAS 20294$+$4255, which seems to represent a textbook example of triggered star formation.