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Context. Water vapor emission at 22 GHz from masers associated with star-forming regions is highly variable. Aims. We present a database of up to 20 years of monitoring of a sample of 43 masers within star-forming regions. The sample covers a large range of luminosities of the associated IRAS source and is representative of the entire population of H2O masers of this type. The database forms a good starting point for any further study of H2O maser variability. Methods. The observations were obtained with the Medicina 32-m radiotelescope, at a rate of 4-5 observations per year. Results. To provide a database that can be easily accessed through the web, we give for each source: plots of the calibrated spectra, the velocity-time-flux density plot, the light curve of the integrated flux, the lower and upper envelopes of the maser emission, the mean spectrum, and the rate of the maser occurrence as a function of velocity. Figures for just one source are given in the text for representative purposes. Figures for all the sources are given in electronic form in the on-line appendix. A discussion of the main properties of the H2O variability in our sample will be presented in a forthcoming paper., Comment: 11 pages, 9 figures, to be published in Astronomy and Astrophysics; all plots in appendix (not included) can be downloaded from http://www.arcetri.astro.it/~starform/water_maser_v2.html or http://www.ira.inaf.it/papers/masers/water_maser_v2.html

An overview is given of the analysis of more than a decade of H2O maser data from our monitoring program. We find the maser emission to generally depend on the luminosity of the YSO as well as on the geometry of the SFR. There appears to be a threshold luminosity of a few times 10**4 Lsol above and below which we find different maser characteristics., Comment: 9 pages, 1 table, 11 figures. Accepted for publ. in Ap&SpSci. Refereed contribution to "Dense Molecular Gas around Protostars and in Galactic Nuclei", European Workshop 2004 on Astronomical Molecules. Eds. Y. Hagiwara, W.A. Baan, H.J. van Langevelde

The S235A-B star forming region has been extensively observed in the past from the radio to the near-IR, but what was happening in the immediate surroundings of the water maser, placed in between the two nebulosities, was still unclear because of insufficient resolution especially in the spectral range from the Far-IR to the mm, even though there were sound indications that new young stellar objects (YSOs) are being formed there. We present here new high resolution maps at mm wavelengths in different molecules (HCO+, C34S, H2CS, SO2 and CH3CN), as well as in the 1.2 and 3.3 mm continuum obtained with the Plateau de Bure interferometer, and JCMT observations at 450 micron and 850 micron that unambiguously reveal the presence of new YSOs placed in between the two HII regions S235A and S235B and associated with the water maser. A molecular core and an unresolved source in the mm and in the sub-mm are centred on the maser, with indication of mass infall onto the core. Two molecular bipolar outflows and a jet originate from the same position. Weak evidence is found for a molecular rotating disk perpendicular to the direction of the main bipolar outflow. The derived parameters indicate that one of the YSOs is an intermediate luminosity object (L~1000 Lsun) in a very early evolutionary phase, embedded in a molecular core of ~100 Msun, with a temperature of 30 K. The main source of energy for the YSO could come from gravitational infall, thus making of this YSO a rare example of intermediate luminosity protostar representing a link between the earliest evolutionary phases of massive stars and low mass protostars of class 0-I., Comment: 19 pages, 22 figures, to be published in Astronomy & Astrophysics

(Abridged) H2O masers in 14 SFRs have been monitored once every 2-3 months for up to 13 years. We investigate the dependence of the overall spectral morphology of the maser emission and its variability on the luminosity of the YSO, and look for bursts and gradients in individual components. We find that higher-luminosity sources tend to be associated with stronger and more stable masers.Higher-luminosity YSOs can excite more emission components over a larger range in velocity, yet the emission that dominates the spectra is at a velocity very near that of the molecular cloud in which the objects are embedded. For Lfir > 3E+04 Lo the maser emission becomes increasingly structured and more extended in velocity with increasing Lfir. Below this limit the maser emission shows the same variety of morphologies, but without a clear dependence on Lfir and with a smaller velocity extent. Also, for sources with Lfir above this limit, the water maser is always present above the 5sigma-level; below it, the typical 5sigma detection rate is 75-80%. We conclude that there must be a lower limit to Lfir, below which the associated maser is below the detection level most of the time. These results can be understood in terms of scaled versions of similar SFRs with different YSO luminosities, each with many potential sites of maser amplification, which can be excited provided there is sufficient energy to pump them, i.e. the basic pumping process is identical regardless of the YSO luminosity. In SFRs with lower input energies, the conditions of maser amplification are much closer to the threshold conditions, and consequently more unstable. We find indications that the properties of the maser emission may be determined also by the geometry of the SFR, specifically by the beaming and collimation properties of the outflow driven by the YSO., Comment: 15 pages, with 15 figs, 2 tables. Accepted for publ. in Astron. & Astroph. A version of this paper with higher-resolution versions of Figs. 10-15 can be found on http://www.arcetri.astro.it/~starform/publ2003.htm

The ISOGAL project is an infrared survey of specific regions sampling the Galactic Plane selected to provide information on Galactic structure,stellar populations,stellar mass-loss and the recent star formation history of the inner disk and Bulge of the Galaxy. ISOGAL combines 7 and 15 micron ISOCAM observations - with a resolution of 6'' at worst - with DENIS IJKs data to determine the nature of the sources and theinterstellar extinction. We have observed about 16 square degrees with a sensitivity approaching 10-20mJy, detecting ~10^5 sources,mostly AGB stars,red giants and young stars. The main features of the ISOGAL survey and the observations are summarized in this paper,together with a brief discussion of data processing and quality. The primary ISOGAL products are described briefly (a full description is given in Schuller et al. 2003, astro-ph/0304309): viz. the images and theISOGAL-DENIS five-wavelength point source catalogue. The main scientific results already derived or in progress are summarized. These include astrometrically calibrated 7 and 15um images,determining structures of resolved sources; identification and properties of interstellar dark clouds; quantification of the infrared extinction law and source dereddening; analysis of red giant and (especially) AGB stellar populations in the central Bulge,determining luminosity,presence of circumstellar dust and mass--loss rate,and source classification,supplemented in some cases by ISO/CVF spectroscopy; detection of young stellar objects of diverse types,especially in the inner Bulge with information about the present and recent star formation rate; identification of foreground sources with mid-IR excess. These results are the subject of about 25 refereed papers published or in preparation., Comment: A&A in press. 19 pages,10 Ps figures; problems with figures fixed

The 7 and 15 um observations of selected fields in the Galactic Plane obtained with ISOCAM during the ISOGAL program offer an unique possibility to search for previously unknown YSOs, undetected by IRAS because of lower sensitivity or confusion problems. In a previous paper (Felli et al. 2000) we established criteria of general validity to select YSOs from the much larger population of Post Main Sequence (Post-MS) stars present in the ISOGAL fields by comparing radio and IR observations of five fields located at l +45 deg. The selection was based primarily on the position of the point sources in the [15] - [7]--[15] diagram, which involves only ISOGAL data and allows to find possible YSOs using the survey data alone. In the present work we revise the adopted criteria by comparing radio-identified UC HII regions and ISOGAL observations over a much larger region. The main indications of the previous analysis are confirmed, but the criteria for selecting YSO candidates had to be revised to select only bright objects, in order to limit the contamination of the sample by Post-MS stars. The revised criteria ([15]<=4.5, [7]--[15]>=1.8) are then used to extract YSO candidates from the ISOGAL Point Source Catalogue in preparation. We select a total of 715 YSO candidates, corresponding to ~2% of the sources with good detections at 7 and 15 um. The results are presented in a table form that provides an unique input list of small diameter, <=6", Galactic YSO candidates. The global properties of the sample of YSO candidates are briefly discussed., Comment: 21 pages, A&A in press, table 3 and full resolution pictures available at: http://www.arcetri.astro.it/~lt/preprints/preprints.html

By cross-correlating the results of two recent large-scale surveys, the general properties of a well defined sample of semi-regular variable stars have been determined. ISOGAL mid-infrared photometry and MACHO lightcurves are assembled for approximately 300 stars in the Baade's Windows of low extinction towards the Galactic bulge. These stars are mainly giants of late M spectral type, evolving along the asymptotic giant branch (AGB). They are found to possess a wide and continuous distribution of pulsation periods and to obey an approximate log~period -- bolometric magnitude relation or set of such relations. Approximate mass-loss rates in the range of 1e-8 to 5e-7 M_sun per year are derived from ISOGAL mid-infrared photometry and models of stellar spectra adjusted for the presence of optically-thin circumstellar silicate dust. Mass-loss rates depend on luminosity and pulsation period. Some stars lose mass as rapidly as short-period Miras but do not show Mira-like amplitudes. A period of 70 days or longer is a necessary but not a sufficient condition for mass loss to occur. For AGB stars in the mass-loss ranges that we observe, the functional dependence of mass-loss rate on temperature and luminosity is found to be in agreement with recent theoretical predictions. If we include our mass-loss rates with a sample of extreme mass-losing AGB stars in the Large Magellanic Cloud, we get the general result for AGB stars that mass-loss rate is proportional to luminosity^{2.7}, valid for AGB stars with 10^{-8} to 10^{-4} M_sun per year (Abridged)., Comment: to appear in The Astrophysical Journal, 51 pages, 9 figures, 3 tables; table 1 will be available in machine-readable format at the electronic ApJ