SIMBAD references

We investigate the thermal condensation caused by a massive object that passes through the interstellar medium with high velocity, and propose a mechanism for creating a filamentary gaseous object, or interstellar contrail. Our main result shows that a long interstellar contrail can form with a certain parameter; a compact object more massive than 10⁴M_☉ can make a filament whose length is larger than 100 pc. Observation of interstellar contrails may provide information on the number, masses, and velocities of fast-moving massive objects, and can be a new method for probing invisible gravitating sources such as intermediate-mass black holes.