Crété E. , Giard M. , & Joblin C.
Centre d'Étude Spatiale des Rayonnements, 9, avenue du Colonel Roche, BP 4346, F-31028 Toulouse Cedex 04, France
We will present high angular resolution Isocam observations (1.5 arcsecond per pixel) of the M17 HII region/molecular cloud interface from 4.5 to 10 m. These allowed us to map the 6.2 m and 7.7 m carbonaceous dust features together with the adjacent continuum. Analyzed with ground-based data at 3.3 m, these data are compared with the PAH and Coal dust models. We show that the observations favor the models with nano-metric sized particles, even in the direction of the HII region. In addition to the classical PAH component which is located at the HII/molecular interface and is responsible for the classical emission features, our data show the presence of an additional component of nanometric particles emitting in the 8 to 10 m range in the direction of the HII region.