SHARCII
imaged massive quiescent cores in Orion at 350 micron 
The conditions of dense
molecular gas in the presence of massive cluster could shed lights into
important questions regarding star formation, such as the initial
conditions of massive star formation and the how the stellar mass is
determined in the process. Using SHARC II camera, we have obtained
images of 51 so called "cores", precursors of new stars, in the Orion
molecular cloud. These Orion cores comprise one of the rare sample of
spatially resolved massive cores, which allow us to look into the
conditions of the making of likely massive stars. The majority of the
Orion cores are probably supercritical, i.e., on the verge of collapse
and the onset of star formation. The distribution of core mass differs
from that of the stars. The environment surrounding dense cores
probably plays a role in determining the mass of future stars.
This result was published in Li et al. 2006.
Figure 1. Left Panel: The observed SHARC II 350 micron image of the
ORI2 region with the flux given in Jy/beam.
Right Panel: The resolution-enhance image of the same region. The
yellow squares denote the location of dense cores.