Poster abstract details

During the transition from an AGB star to a Planetary Nebula, the majority of the low/intermediate initial mass star loses its spherical symmetry. The process responsible for that change of morphology is, so far, not well understood. The candidates responsible for shaping these objects are (i)~a companion to the star (binary/heavy planet) and its tidal forces, (ii)~disk interaction and (iii)~magnetic fields - or a combination of these. In this work, we focus on the third candidate. We investigated the polarization of the H$_2$O maser emissions of the pre-Planetary Nebula OH231.8+4.2 (Rotten Egg Nebula), to infer the properties of its magnetic field. Our preliminary results show that a magnetic field B$_{||}$ of $\sim$46~mG is present in the H$_2$0 maser region of this pPN.