2025ApJ...979...68D

We present new James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) Mid-Infrared Instrument Medium-Resolution Spectrometer observations of the nearby ultraluminous infrared galaxy (ULIRG) F08572+3915 NW. These integral field spectroscopic (IFS) data reveal a kpc-scale warm-molecular rotating disk and biconical outflow traced by the H₂ν = 0-0 S(1), S(2), S(3), and S(5) rotational transitions. The outflow maintains a relatively constant median (maximum) projected velocity of 1100 km s^–1 (3000 km s^–1) out to ∼1.4 kpc from the nucleus. The outflowing H₂ material is slightly warmer (640-700 K) than the rotating disk material (460-520 K), perhaps due to shock heating in the highly turbulent outflowing material. This outflow shares the same kinematics and orientation as the sub-kiloparsec scale warm H₂ outflow traced by the rovibrational H₂ lines in Keck AO near-infrared IFS data. However, this warm H₂ outflow is significantly faster than the sub-kiloparsec-scale cold molecular outflow derived from multi-transition far-infrared OH observations with Herschel and the greater than or equivalent to kiloparsec-scale cold molecular outflow mapped by millimeter-wave interferometric CO 1-0 observations with IRAM-PdBI and NOEMA. The new JWST data bolster the scenario where the buried quasar in this ULIRG is excavating the dust screen, accelerating perhaps as much as 60% of the dusty warm molecular material to velocities beyond the escape velocity, and thus influencing the evolution of the host galaxy.