C2D Full OFF-CLOUD Catalog: Spitzer Telescope Observations of Star-Forming Regions

Five of the nearest large molecular clouds—Chamaeleon II, Lupus, Ophiuchus, Perseus, and Serpens—were surveyed by the Cores to Disks (C2D) Spitzer Legacy Program. The program used the IRAC, MIPS, and IRS instruments to observe sources from molecular cores to protoplanetary disks, targeting about 150 known compact cores and 190 young stellar systems. This catalog, from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, provides the most complete but least reliable list of sources in the OFF-CLOUDS fields.

Use Cases

• Identify candidate protostars and substellar objects based on infrared observations.
• Study the evolution of circumstellar dust, the raw material for planetary cores, in systems up to 10 million years old.
• Compare star-forming environments across a wide range of cloud masses and stellar masses.
• Analyze the completeness and reliability of source catalogs in large astronomical surveys.

Strengths

• Observations span the full evolutionary sequence from molecular cores to protoplanetary disks.
• Data collected using all three Spitzer instruments (IRAC, MIPS, and IRS).
• Sensitivity to objects as faint as 0.001 solar luminosities.
• Covers five distinct, nearby molecular cloud regions for comparative analysis.

Limitations

• Description metadata is limited; actual data quality requires manual inspection after download.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• The catalog is described as the 'most complete but least reliable' list of sources.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Collection Method

Observations from the Spitzer Space Telescope's IRAC, MIPS, and IRS instruments as part of the Cores to Disks (C2D) Legacy Program.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-13 17:08:18.074296; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Molecular cloud regions: Chamaeleon II, Lupus, Ophiuchus, Perseus, and Serpens.