A Catalogue of Linear Polarization Measurements for 5070 Stars

“The MFKNK, Axon and Ellis (1976), Reiz and Franco (1998) and Goodman (1997) catalogs were originally provided to us in electronic form.”

“This behavior is very reminiscent of the alignment of Galactic star polarization vectors with the Galactic plane (Mathewson & Ford 1970; Axon & Ellis 1976).”

“Using the data available at the time, Axon & Ellis (1976) compiled a catalog of 5070 stars with reliable distances.”

“Structure in the Galactic magnetic field on smaller scales has been apparent in polarization data of stars within 1 kpc (e.g. Axon & Ellis 1976; Mathewson & Ford 1970; Leroy 1999; Heiles 2000; Berdyugin & Teerikorpi 2002; Berdyugin et al. 2004, and references therein), and polarization of diffuse…”

“…(Spoelstra 1972), (b) to have strong X-ray emission (e.g. Bunner et al. 1972), (c) to be probably associated with a vertical H i filament at l ∼ 40◦ at velocities around 0 km s−1 (Heiles & Jenkins 1976; Colomb et al. 1980), and (d) to align with starlight polarization (e.g. Axon & Ellis 1976).”

“Several authors found that this is indeed true for stars toward the NPS that are within a distance of 100 − 200 pc (Spoelstra 1971, 1972; Axon & Ellis 1976; Salter 1983; Vi-dal et al. 2015).”

“The NPS is a local feature believed to correspond to the superposition of several supernovae and is clearly seen in X-ray emission maps (see e.g. Snowden et al. (1997)) and in maps of polarization towards nearby stars (Mathewson & Ford 1970; Heiles & Jenkins 1976; Axon & Ellis 1976).”

“Conversely, the interstellar magnetic field direction, determined from optical polarimetry of field stars, lies at 1708 (e.g. Axon & Ellis 1976; Klare & Neckel 1979), almost orthogonal to the MIR magnetic field and closely parallel to the dust ridge.”

“…radiation, alignment with starlight polarisation, and alignment with HI filaments at high latitudes (Heiles (2000), Heiles & Jenkins (1976), Axon & Ellis (1976)) all indicated that the NPS is nearby. de Geus (1992), Wolleben (2007) predicted that it is centred at the Sco-Cen OB association.”

“All-sky optical polarization surveys have shown that, particularly along the Galactic Plane, polarization vec- tors tend to present an overall horizontal orientation, i.e., parallel to the plane (Mathewson & Ford 1970; Axon & Ellis 1976; Heiles & Crutcher 2005).”

“3, the combination of magnetic fields and dust grains in our Galaxy is well known to polarize optical light from distant stars and to be at the origin of alignment patterns of star polarization vectors (e.g., Mathewson & Ford 1970; Axon & Ellis 1976; Planck Collaboration Int.”

“Axon & Ellis (1976) compiled optical polarization data of more than 5000 stars and showed that those in the distance range 2–4 kpc in the l .”

“This allows us to investigate the structure of both the macroscopic field in our Galaxy (Mathewson & Ford 1970; Axon & Ellis 1976) and the local field associated with the individual clouds (Goodman et al. 1990).”

“…of the Carrera del Investigador Científico, CONICET, Argentina. the structure of both the macroscopic field in our Galaxy (Mathewson & Ford 1970; Axon & Ellis 1976) and the local field associated with the individual clouds (Goodman et al. 1990).”

“This result is consistent with those from maps of optical polarization that indicate that the direction of the magnetic field in the Galaxy follows the Galactic plane (Mathewson & Ford 1970; Axon & Ellis 1976).”

“From the data in the Catalogue of linear polarization of Axon and Ellis (1976), the angle of the polarization vector in this direction seems to show a complex pattern not associated with the direction of the galactic plane in a large range of distances.”

“…the projected direction of the magnetic field at the region (Lazarian 2007) whether it is a macroscopic field in the Galaxy (Mathewson & Ford 1970; Axon & Ellis 1976) or the local magnetic fields of the cloud (Goodman et al. 1990), whereas the microscopic properties are the size distribution,…”

“…map the projected direction of the magnetic field on the plane of the sky , and this allows the investigation of the structure of both the macroscopic field in our Galaxy (Mathewson and Ford 1970; Axon and Ellis 1976) and the local field associated with the individual clouds (Goodman et al. 1990).”

“…stars in our Galaxy indicate that optical polarization arises from directional absorption or scattering by aligned elongated dust grains in the interstellar medium (ISM) (Whittet 2003; Mathewson & Ford 1970; Axon & Ellis 1976) commonly known as the Davis–Greenstein effect (Davis & Greenstein 1951).”

“…properties of the ISM, e.g., the geometry of the magnetic field at small scale (Goodman et al. 1990) as well as large scale (Mathewson & Ford 1971; Axon & Ellis 1976; Berdyugin et al. 2014; Clemens et al. 2020), and grain properties such as size, shape, chemical composition, and grain efficiency…”

“3, the combination of magnetic fields and dust grains in our Galaxy is well known to polarize optical light from distant stars and to be at the origin of alignment patterns of star polarization vectors (e.g., Mathewson & Ford 1970; Axon & Ellis 1976; Planck Collaboration Int.”