The mass dependence of stellar rotation in the Orion Nebula cluster

We have determined new rotation periods for 404 stars in the Orion Nebula cluster (ONC) using the Wide Field Imager attached to the MPG/ESO 2.2 m telescope on La Silla, Chile. Mass estimates are available for 335 of these, and most have M<0.3 M-.. We confirm the existence of a bimodal period distribution for the higher mass stars in our sample and show that the median rotation rate decreases with increasing mass for stars in the range 0.1 M-. < M < 0.4 M-.. While the spread in angular momentum J at any given mass is more than a factor of 10, the majority of lower mass stars in the ONC rotate at rates approaching 30% of their critical breakup velocity, as opposed to 5%-10% for solar-like stars. This is a consequence of both a small increase in observed specific angular momentum (j=J/M) and a larger decrease in the critical value of j with decreasing mass. Perhaps the most striking fact, however, is that j varies by so little-less than a factor of 2-over the interval 0.1-1.0 M-.. The distribution of rotation rates with mass in the ONC (with an age of <similar to>1 Myr) is similar in nature, to what is found in the Pleiades (with an age of similar to 100 Myr). These observations provide a significant new guide and test for models of stellar angular momentum evolution during the protostellar and pre-main-sequence phases.