Residual Gas and Dust around Transition Objects and Weak T Tauri Stars

Residual gas in disks around young stars can spin down stars, circularize the orbits of terrestrial planets, and whisk away the dusty debris that is expected to serve as a signpost of terrestrial planet formation. We have carried out a sensitive search for residual gas and dust in the terrestrial pl...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Astrophysical journal 2017-02, Vol.836 (2), p.242
Main Authors: Doppmann, Greg W., Najita, Joan R., Carr, John S.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
ABUNDANCE
Accretion disks
Astrophysics
ASTROPHYSICS, COSMOLOGY AND ASTRONOMY
CARBON
CARBON MONOXIDE
CORRECTIONS
Deposition
Dust
DUSTS
EMISSION
Emissions
GASES
INTERSTELLAR SPACE
MASS
Organic chemistry
Planet formation
PLANETS
PROTOPLANETS
Residual gas
RESOLUTION
SPECTRA
SPIN
Stars
Stellar age
T TAURI STARS
Terrestrial planets
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Summary:Residual gas in disks around young stars can spin down stars, circularize the orbits of terrestrial planets, and whisk away the dusty debris that is expected to serve as a signpost of terrestrial planet formation. We have carried out a sensitive search for residual gas and dust in the terrestrial planet region surrounding young stars ranging in age from a few to ∼10 Myr. Using high-resolution 4.7 μ m spectra of transition objects (TOs) and weak T Tauri stars, we searched for weak continuum excesses and CO fundamental emission, after making a careful correction for the stellar contribution to the observed spectrum. We find that the CO emission from TOs is weaker and located farther from the star than CO emission from nontransition T Tauri stars with similar stellar accretion rates. The difference is possibly the result of chemical and/or dynamical effects (i.e., a low CO abundance or close-in low-mass planets). The weak T Tauri stars show no CO fundamental emission down to low flux levels (5 × 10 −20 to 10 −18 W m −2 ). We illustrate how our results can be used to constrain the residual disk gas content in these systems and discuss their potential implications for star and planet formation.
ISSN:0004-637X
1538-4357
DOI:10.3847/1538-4357/aa5c3c