Dynamical Formation of Dark Molecular Hydrogen Clouds around Diffuse H ii Regions

Abstract

We examine the triggering process of molecular cloud formation around diffuse HII regions. We calculate the time evolution of the shell as well as of the HII region in a two-phase neutral medium, solving the UV and FUV radiative transfer, the thermal and chemical processes in the time-dependent hydrodynamics code. In the cold neutral medium, the ambient gas is swept up in the cold (T \sim 30-40K) and dense (n \sim 10^3 cm^-3) shell around the HII region. In the shell, H_2 molecules are formed from the swept-up HI gas, but CO molecules are hardly formed. The reformation of H_2 molecules is more efficient with a higher-mass central star. The physical and chemical properties of gas in the shell are just intermediate between those of the neutral medium and molecular clouds observed by the CO emission. The dense shell with cold HI/H_2 gas easily becomes gravitationally unstable, and breaks up into small clouds. The cooling layer just behind the shock front also suffers from thermal instability, and will fragment into cloudlets with some translational motions. We suggest that the predicted cold ``dark'' HI/H_2 gas should be detected as the HI self-absorption (HISA) feature. We have sought such features in recent observational data, and found shell-like HISA features around the giant HII regions, W4 and W5. The shell-like HISA feature shows good spatial correlation with dust emission, but poor correlation with CO emission. Our quantitative analysis shows that the HISA cloud can be as cold as T \sim a few x 10K. (abridged)