Alfred E. Glassgold

The Origin of Chondrules and Refractory Inclusions in Chondritic Meteorites

Examples of calcium-aluminum-rich inclusions (CAIs) surrounded by thick chondrule mantles have been found in chondritic meteorites and cast doubt on the conventional belief that CAIs and chondrules possessed different spacetime origins in the primitive solar nebula. We study specific processes by which such objects, and the more common ordinary CAIs and chondrules, might have formed by flare heating of primitive rocks interior to the inner edge of a gaseous accretion disk that has been truncated by magnetized funnel flow onto the central proto-Sun. Motivated by the appearance of the chains of Herbig-Haro knots that define collimated optical jets from many young stellar objects (YSOs), we adopt the model of a fluctuating X-wind, where the inner edge of the solar nebula undergoes periodic radial excursions on a timescale of ~30 yr, perhaps in response to protosolar magnetic cycles. Flares induced by the stressing of magnetic fields threading both the star and the inner edge of the fluctuating disk melt or partially melt solids in the transition zone between the base of the funnel flow and the reconnection ring, and in the reconnection ring itself. The rock melts stick when they collide at low velocities. Surface tension pulls the melt aggregate into a quasi-spherical core/mantle structure, where the core consists mainly of refractories and the mantle mainly of moderate volatiles. Orbital drift of rocks past the inner edge of the disk or infall of large objects from the funnel flow replaces the steady loss of material by the plasma drag of the coronal gas that corotates with the stellar magnetosphere. In quasi-steady state, agglomeration of molten or heat-softened rocks leads to a differential size-distribution in radius R proportional to R-3e, where tL ~ 20 yr is the drift time of an object of fiducial radius L ≡ 1 cm and t is the time since the last inward excursion of the base of the funnel flow and X-wind. Thus, during the ~30 yr interval between successive flushing of the reconnection ring, flash-heated and irradiated rocks have a chance to grow to millimeter and centimeter sizes. The evaporation of the moderately volatile mantles above large refractory cores, or the dissolving of small refractory cores inside thick ferromagnesian mantles before launch, plus extended heating in the X-wind produce the CAIs or chondrules that end up at planetary distances in the parent bodies of chondritic meteorites.

HEATING PROTOPLANETARY DISK ATMOSPHERES

We calculate the thermal-chemical structure of the gaseous atmospheres of the inner disks of T Tauri stars, starting from the density and dust temperature distributions derived by D’Alessio and coworkers in 1999. As a result of processes such as X-ray irradiation or mechanical heating of the surface layers, the gas temperature at the very top of the disk atmosphere in the neighborhood of 1 AU is of the order of 5000 K. Deep down, it drops rapidly into the range of the dust temperature, i.e., several hundred degrees kelvin. In between these upper hot and lower cool layers, there is a transition zone with gas temperatures in the range 500–2000 K. The thickness and location of this warm region depend on the strength of the surface heating. This region also manifests the basic chemical transitions of H to H2 and C + and C to CO. It is remarkable that even though the H2 transition begins first (higher up), it does not go to completion until after CO does. Consequently, there is a reasonably thick layer of warm CO that is predominantly atomic H. This thermal-chemical structure is favorable to the excitation of the fundamental and overtone bands of CO because of the large rate coefficients for vibrational excitation in H+CO as opposed to H2+CO collisions. This conclusion is supported by the recent observations of the fundamental band transitions in most T Tauri stars. We also argue that layered atmospheres of inner T Tauri disks may play an important role in understanding the observations of H2 UV fluorescence pumped from excited vibrational levels of that molecule. Possible candidates for surface heating include the interaction of a wind with the upper layers of the disk and dissipation of hydromagnetic waves generated by mechanical disturbances close to the midplane, e.g., by the Balbus-Hawley instability. Detailed modeling of the observations has the potential to reveal the nature of the mechanical surface heating that we model phenomenologically in these calculations and to help explain the nature of the gas in protoplanetary disks.

Protostellar Cosmic Rays and Extinct Radioactivities in Meteorites

Calcium-aluminum-rich inclusions (CAIs) and chondrules of chondritic meteorites may originate with the melting of dustballs launched by a magnetically driven bipolar outflow from the inner edge of the primitive solar nebula. Bombardment by protostellar cosmic rays may make the rock precursors of CAIs and chondrules radioactive, producing radionuclides found in meteorites that are difficult to obtain with other mechanisms. Reasonable scalings from the observed hard X-rays for the cosmic-ray protons released by flares in young stellar objects yield the correct amounts of 41Ca,53Mn, and 138La inferred for meteorites, but proton- and α-induced transformations underproduce 26Al by a factor of about 20. The missing 26Al may be synthesized by 3He nuclei accelerated in impulsive flares reacting primarily with 24Mg, an abundant isotope in the target precursor rocks. The mechanism allows a simple explanation for the very different ratios of 26Al/27Al inferred for normal CAIs, CAIs with fractionated and unidentified nuclear (FUN) anomalies, and chondrules. The overproduction of 41Ca by analogous 3He reactions and the case of 60Fe inferred for eucritic meteorites require special interpretations in this picture.

Extinct Radioactivities and Protosolar Cosmic Rays: Self-Shielding and Light Elements

We study the eUects of self-shielding in the X-wind model of protosolar cosmic-ray irradiation of early solar-system rocks. We adopt a two-component picture of protoCAIs consisting of cores with the elemental abundances of type B1 CAIs (calcium-aluminum-rich inclusions) and mantles of less refractory material. The cores have a power-law distribution of sizes between and The mantles have a R min R max . uniform thickness, whose value is chosen to bring the total inventory of elements at least as refractory as sulfur to cosmic abundances for the entire population of protoCAIs. Each object is irradiated with a —uence consistent with the product of their residence time in the reconnection ring and the —ux of solar cosmic rays obtained by a scaling of impulsive —ares from the hard X-rays observed from low-mass protostars. For in the 50 km regime and in the few centimeter regime, which corresponds to the R min R max range of sizes of observed CAIs in micrometeorites and chondrites, we recover approximately the canonical values quoted for the ratios 26Al/27Al, 53Mn/55Mn, and 41Ca/40Ca in CV3 meteorites. Moreover, the excess 138La (denoted as 138La*) produced by proton bombardment of 138Ba lies within the CAI range obtained in the experiments of Shen et al. When we include fragmentation reactions that produce 10Be from the impact of protons, alphas, and 3He on the 16O that is bound up in rocks, we further obtain a level of 10Be/9Be that agrees approximately with the report of McKeegan et al. for a CAI from the Allende meteorite. Similar calculations for the expected anomalies in the stable isotopes of lithium show rough consistency with the measured values and further support our interpretation. The value for 10Be/9Be is particularly difficult to produce by any other astrophysical mechanism. Thus, the 10Be discovery greatly strengthens the case for an origin in early solar-system irradiation, rather than external stellar seeding, for the shortest-lived radionuclides inferred from CAIs in chondritic meteorites.

The photodissociation of CO in circumstellar envelopes

The CO photodissociation rate for the unshielded ISM is calculated using recent laboratory results which confirm that photodissociation occurs by way of line absorption. A value of 2.0 x 10 to the -10th/s, an order of magnitude higher than the rate used in the past, is obtained. The new rate and a treatment of the radiative transfer and shielding are used to develop a theory for the CO abundance in the circumstellar envelopes of cool, evolved stars, and results are presented on the spatial variation of CO, C, and C(+). It is shown that these distributions play important roles in determining the observational properties of circumstellar envelopes. 29 references.

Cosmic-ray ionization of molecular clouds

Context. Low-energy cosmic rays are a fundamental source of ionization for molecular clouds, influencing their chemical, thermal, and dynamical evolution. Aims. The purpose of this work is to explore the possibility that a low-energy component of cosmic rays, not directly measurable from the Earth, can account for the discrepancy between the ionization rate measured in diffuse and dense interstellar clouds. Methods. We collected the most recent experimental and theoretical data on the cross sections for the production of H + and He + by electron and proton impact and discuss the available constraints on the cosmic-ray fluxes in the local interstellar medium. Starting from different extrapolations at low energies of the demodulated cosmic-ray proton and electron spectra, we computed the propagated spectra in molecular clouds in the continuous slowing-down approximation taking all the relevant energy loss processes into account. Results. The theoretical value of the cosmic-ray ionization rate as a function of the column density of traversed matter agrees with the observational data only if the flux of either cosmic-ray electrons or of protons increases at low energies. The most successful models are characterized by a significant (or even dominant) contribution of the electron component to the ionization rate, in agreement with previous suggestions. However, the large spread of cosmic-ray ionization rates inferred from chemical models of molecular cloud cores remains to be explained. Conclusions. Available data combined with simple propagation models support the existence of a low-energy component (below ∼100 MeV) of cosmic-ray electrons or protons responsible for the ionization of molecular cloud cores and dense protostellar envelopes.

Heating and Ionization of X-Winds

In order to compare the X-wind with observations, one needs to be able to calculate its thermal and ionization properties. We formulate the physical basis for the streamline-by-streamline integration of the ionization and heat equations of the steady X-wind. In addition to the well-known processes associated with the interaction of stellar and accretion funnel hot spot radiation with the wind, we include X-ray heating and ionization, mechanical heating, and a revised calculation of ambipolar diffusion heating. The mechanical heating arises from fluctuations produced by star-disk interactions of the time-dependent X-wind that are carried by the wind to large distances where they are dissipated in shocks, MHD waves, and turbulent cascades. We model the time-averaged heating by the scale-free volumetric heating rate, Γmech = αρv3s-1, where ρ and v are the local mass density and wind speed, respectively, s is the distance from the origin, and α is a phenomenological constant. When we consider a partially revealed but active young stellar object, we find that choosing α ~ 10-3 in our numerical calculations produces temperatures and electron fractions that are high enough for the X-wind jet to radiate in the optical forbidden lines at the level and on the spatial scales that are observed. We also discuss a variety of applications of our thermal-chemical calculations that can lead to further observational checks of X-wind theory.

The Irradiation Origin of Beryllium Radioisotopes and Other Short-lived Radionuclides

Two explanations exist for the short-lived radionuclides (T1/2 ≤ 5 Myr) present in the solar system when the calcium-aluminum-rich inclusions (CAIs) first formed. They originated either from the ejecta of a supernova or by the in situ irradiation of nebular dust by energetic particles. With a half-life of only 53 days, 7Be is then the key discriminant, since it can be made only by irradiation. Using the same irradiation model developed earlier by our group, we calculate the yield of 7Be. Within model uncertainties associated mainly with nuclear cross sections, we obtain agreement with the experimental value. Moreover, if 7Be and 10Be have the same origin, the irradiation time must be short (a few to tens of years), and the proton flux must be of order F ~ 2 × 1010 cm-2 s-1. The X-wind model provides a natural astrophysical setting that gives the requisite conditions. In the same irradiation environment, 26Al, 36Cl, and 53Mn are also generated at the measured levels within model uncertainties, provided that irradiation occurs under conditions reminiscent of solar impulsive events (steep energy spectra and high 3He abundance). The decoupling of the 26Al and 10Be observed in some rare CAIs receives a quantitative explanation when rare gradual events (shallow energy spectra and low 3He abundance) are considered. The yields of 41Ca are compatible with an initial solar system value inferred from the measured initial 41Ca/40Ca ratio and an estimate of the thermal metamorphism time (from Young et al.), alleviating the need for two-layer proto-CAIs. Finally, we show that the presence of supernova-produced 60Fe in the solar accretion disk does not necessarily mean that other short-lived radionuclides have a stellar origin.

Kinematic Diagnostics of Disks around Young Stars: CO Overtone Emission from WL 16 and 1548C27

We report high spectral resolution observations of the CO vibrational overtone emission from the young stellar object 1548C27; our observations include both the CO(2-0) and CO(5-3) bandhead regions. These data and similar observations of the young stellar object WL16, reported in a previous contribution to this journal, provide some of the most compelling evidence to date for the existence of inner disks around young stars. We describe the simple procedure that we use to synthesize bandhead emission from disks including the effect of thermal dissociation of CO and non-LTE excitation of the vibrational levels. Using this spectral synthesis procedure to extract the kinematics and physical properties of the emitting gas from the overtone data, we show how these high signal-to-noise data are also powerful probes of the stellar and inner disk properties of these systems. Our modeling is consistent with the identification of WL16 and 1548C27 as Herbig AeBe stars with stellar masses of approximately 2 and 4 solar masses, respectively. Thus, the kinematic signature of rotating disks in the overtone spectra of these sources provides strong support for the role of accretion disks in the formation of intermediate mass stars. For both WL16 and 1548C27, we interpret our modeling results as indicating that the overtone emission arises from a temperature inversion region in the inner disk atmosphere. We also find evidence for suprathermally broadened lines and are able to place useful constraints on the radial temperature and column density distributions of the CO line-formation region of the disk atmosphere.

Formation of Water in the Warm Atmospheres of Protoplanetary Disks

The gas-phase chemistry of water in protoplanetary disks is analyzed with a model based on X-ray heating and ionization of the disk atmosphere. Several uncertain processes appear to play critical roles in generating the column densities of warm water that are detected from disks at infrared wavelengths. The dominant factors are the reactions that form molecular hydrogen, including formation on warm grains, and the ionization and heating of the atmosphere. All of these can work together to produce a region of high water abundances in the molecular transition layer of the inner disk atmosphere, where atoms are transformed into molecules, the temperature drops from thousands to hundreds of Kelvins, and the ionization begins to be dominated by the heavy elements. Grain formation of molecular hydrogen and mechanical heating of the atmosphere can play important roles in this region and directly affect the amount of warm water in protoplanetary disk atmospheres. Thus, it may be possible to account for the existing measurements of water emission from T Tauri disks without invoking transport of water from cooler to warmer regions. The hydroxyl radical OH is underabundant in this model of disk atmospheres and requires consideration of additional production and excitation processes.