Synthetic Observations of Magnetic Fields in Protostellar Cores
  The role of magnetic fields in the early stages of star formation is not well
constrained. In order to discriminate between different star formation models,
we analyze 3D magnetohydrodynamic simulations of low-mass cores and explore the
correlation between magnetic field orientation and outflow orientation over
time. We produce synthetic observations of dust polarization at resolutions
comparable to millimeter-wave dust polarization maps observed by CARMA and
compare these with 2D visualizations of projected magnetic field and column
density. Cumulative distribution functions of the projected angle between the
magnetic field and outflow show different degrees of alignment in simulations
with differing mass-to-flux ratios. The distribution function for the less
magnetized core agrees with observations finding random alignment between
outflow and field orientations, while the more magnetized core exhibits
stronger alignment. We find that fractional polarization increases when the
system is viewed such that the magnetic field is close to the plane of the sky,
and the values of fractional polarization are consistent with observational
measurements. The simulation outflow, which reflects the underlying angular
momentum of the accreted gas, changes direction significantly over the first
$\sim0.1$ Myr of evolution. This movement could lead to the observed random
alignment between outflows and the magnetic fields in protostellar cores.
