VARIABILITY OF METHANOL MASERS

Sites of recent star formation often radiate strong maser emission from methanol transitions near 6.6 and 12 GHz. We have studied many of these masers over several years and find that intensity variations are common on both transitions. We present observations which demonstrate marked variability in 48 sources. We explore the characteristics of the variability and find it to be typically quasi-periodic, on a timescale of between a month and several years. The amplitude of the variation is most commonly less than a factor of two, but can reach factors of ten. The variability of different features in a source is usually independent. Variability of features seen at both 6.6 and 12 GHz is sometimes correlated, with larger amplitudes usually seen at 12 GHz. A likely inference is that variations are occasionally due to a change in the pump rate throughout the masing region, but most are consistent with a change in the masing path length due to large-scale motions. In addition, it is likely that the majority of 6.6-GHz masers are saturated whereas the 12-GHz masers may be somewhat less saturated.