L183 (L134N) Revisited II. The dust content

Abstract

We present here a complete dust map of L183 (=L134N) with opacities ranging from Av = 3 to 150 mag. Five peaks are identified as being related to known molecular peaks and among these dust peaks two are liable to form stars. The main peak is a prestellar core with a density profile proportional to r-1 up to a radius of ∼4500 AU and the northern peak could possibly be on its way to form a prestellar core. If true, this is the first example of the intermediate steps between cloud cores and prestellar cores during the quasi-static contraction. Additionally, the low dust temperature of the core reported in Pagani et al. (2003b) is confirmed, and the ISOPHOT data are shown to be inappropriate for finding such cores. In the inner core, T dust ∼ 7.5 K and could be as low as 6.7 K.