The Cygnus superbubble revisited

The Orion local spiral arm is seen tangential towards the Cygnus region. In tense radio emission with quite a complex morphology is observed, which app ears to be surrounded by strong soft X-ray emission. This remarkable X-ray structure is known as the Cygnus superbubble. We compare a recent 1.4 GHz r adio continuum and polarization map from the Effelsberg 100-m telescope wit h X-ray data from the ROSAT all-sky survey of this area. Including availabl e survey data of the infrared, H I and CO emission, we investigate a number of high latitude features, which are physically related to one of the Cygn us OB associations. These OB associations, however, are located along the l ocal arm at different distances. Our results support the view that the Cygn us superbubble is not a physical unity, but results from a projection of un related X-ray emitting features at different distances blown out from the l ocal arm seen along the line of sight.