Andras Zsom

The outcome of protoplanetary dust growth: pebbles, boulders, or planetesimals? II. Introducing the bouncing barrier

Context. The evolution of dust particles in protoplanetary disks determines many observable and structural properties of the disk, such as the spectral energy distribution (SED), appearance of disks, temperature profile, and chemistry. Dust coagulation is also the first step towards planet formation. Aims. We investigate dust growth due to settling in a 1D vertical column of a disk. It is known from the ten micron feature in disk SEDs, that small micron-sized grains are present at the disk atmosphere throughout the lifetime of the disk. We hope to explain such questions as what process can keep the disk atmospheres dusty for the lifetime of the disk and how the particle properties change as a function of height above the midplane. Methods. We used a Monte Carlo code to follow the mass and porosity evolution of the particles in time. We gradually build up the complexity of the models by considering the effects of porosity, different collision models, turbulence, and different gas models, respectively. This way we can distinguish the effects of these physical processes on particle growth and motion. The collision model used is based on laboratory experiments performed on dust aggregates. As the experiments cannot cover all possible collision scenarios, the largest uncertainty of our model comes from the necessary extrapolations we had to perform. We simultaneously solved for the particle growth and motion. Particles can move vertically due to settling and turbulent mixing. We assumed that the vertical profile of the gas density is fixed in time and that only the solid component evolves. Results. We find that the used collision model strongly influences the masses and sizes of the particles. The laboratory-experiment based collision model greatly reduces the particle sizes compared to models that assume sticking at all collision velocities. We find that a turbulence parameter of α = 10−2 is needed to keep the dust atmospheres dusty, but such strong turbulence can produce only small particles at the midplane, which does not favor for planetesimal formation models. We also see that the particles are larger at the midplane and smaller at the upper layers of the disk. At 3–4 pressure-scale heights, micron-sized particles are produced. These particle sizes are needed to explain the ten micron feature of disk SEDs. Turbulence may therefore help keep small dust particles in the disk atmosphere.

The outcome of protoplanetary dust growth: pebbles, boulders, or planetesimals? - I. Mapping the zoo of laboratory collision experiments

Context. The growth processes from protoplanetary dust to planetesimals are not fully understood. Laboratory experiments and theoretical models have shown that collisions among the dust aggregates can lead to sticking, bouncing, and fragmentation. However, no systematic study on the collisional outcome of protoplanetary dust has been performed so far, so that a physical model of the dust evolution in protoplanetary disks is still missing. Aims. We intend to map the parameter space for the collisional interaction of arbitrarily porous dust aggregates. This parameter space encompasses the dust-aggregate masses, their porosities and the collision velocity. With such a complete mapping of the collisional outcomes of protoplanetary dust aggregates, it will be possible to follow the collisional evolution of dust in a protoplanetary disk environment. Methods. We use literature data, perform laboratory experiments, and apply simple physical models to get a complete picture of the collisional interaction of protoplanetary dust aggregates. Results. We found four different kinds of sticking, two kinds of bouncing, and three kinds of fragmentation as possible outcomes in collisions among protoplanetary dust aggregates. Our best collision model distinguishes between porous and compact dust. We also differentiate between collisions among similar-sized and different-sized bodies. All in all, eight combinations of porosity and mass ratio can be discerned. For each of these cases, we present a complete collision model for dust-aggregate masses between 10 −12 and 10 2 g and collision velocities in the range of 10 −4 ... 10 4 cm s −1 for arbitrary porosities. This model comprises the collisional outcome, the mass(es) of the resulting aggregate(s) and their porosities. Conclusions. We present the first complete collision model for protoplanetary dust. This collision model can be used for the determination of the dust-growth rate in protoplanetary disks.

Testing the theory of grain growth and fragmentation by millimeter observations of protoplanetary disks

Context. Observations at sub-millimeter and mm wavelengths will in the near future be able to resolve the radial dependence of the mm spectral slope in circumstellar disks with a resolution of around a few AU at the distance of the closest star-forming regions. Aims. We aim to constrain physical models of grain growth and fragmentation by a large sample of (sub-)mm observations of disks around pre-main sequence stars in the Taurus-Auriga and Ophiuchus star-forming regions. Methods. State-of-the-art coagulation/fragmentation and disk-structure codes are coupled to produce steady-state grain size distributions and to predict the spectral slopes at (sub-)mm wavelengths. Results. This work presents the first calculations predicting the mm spectral slope based on a physical model of grain growth. Our models can quite naturally reproduce the observed mm-slopes, but a simultaneous match to the observed range of flux levels can only be reached by a reduction of the dust mass by a factor of a few up to about 30 while keeping the gas mass of the disk the same. This dust reduction can either be caused by radial drift at a reduced rate or during an earlier evolutionary time (otherwise the predicted fluxes would become too low) or due to efficient conversion of dust into larger, unseen bodies.

The outcome of protoplanetary dust growth: pebbles, boulders, or planetesimals? - III. Sedimentation driven coagulation inside the snowline

Context. The evolution of dust particles in protoplanetary disks determines many observable and structural properties of the disk, such as the spectral energy distribution (SED), appearance of disks, temperature profile, and chemistry. Dust coagulation is also the first step towards planet formation. Aims. We investigate dust growth due to settling in a 1D vertical column of a disk. It is known from the ten micron feature in disk SEDs, that small micron-sized grains are present at the disk atmosphere throughout the lifetime of the disk. We hope to explain such questions as what process can keep the disk atmospheres dusty for the lifetime of the disk and how the particle properties change as a function of height above the midplane. Methods. We used a Monte Carlo code to follow the mass and porosity evolution of the particles in time. We gradually build up the complexity of the models by considering the effects of porosity, different collision models, turbulence, and different gas models, respectively. This way we can distinguish the effects of these physical processes on particle growth and motion. The collision model used is based on laboratory experiments performed on dust aggregates. As the experiments cannot cover all possible collision scenarios, the largest uncertainty of our model comes from the necessary extrapolations we had to perform. We simultaneously solved for the particle growth and motion. Particles can move vertically due to settling and turbulent mixing. We assumed that the vertical profile of the gas density is fixed in time and that only the solid component evolves. Results. We find that the used collision model strongly influences the masses and sizes of the particles. The laboratory-experiment based collision model greatly reduces the particle sizes compared to models that assume sticking at all collision velocities. We find that a turbulence parameter of α = 10 −2 is needed to keep the dust atmospheres dusty, but such strong turbulence can produce only small particles at the midplane, which does not favor for planetesimal formation models. We also see that the particles are larger at the midplane and smaller at the upper layers of the disk. At 3–4 pressure-scale heights, micron-sized particles are produced. These particle sizes are needed to explain the ten micron feature of disk SEDs. Turbulence may therefore help keep small dust particles in the disk atmosphere.

Spectral Fingerprints of Earth-like Planets Around FGK Stars

We present model atmospheres for an Earth-like planet orbiting the entire grid of main sequence FGK stars with effective temperatures ranging from Teff=4250 K to Teff=7000 K in 250 K intervals. We have modeled the remotely detectable spectra of Earth-like planets for clear and cloudy atmospheres at the 1 AU equivalent distance from the VIS to IR (0.4 to 20 μm) to compare detectability of features in different wavelength ranges in accordance with the James Webb Space Telescope and future design concepts to characterize exo-Earths. We have also explored the effect of the stellar UV levels as well as spectral energy distribution on a terrestrial atmosphere, concentrating on detectable atmospheric features that indicate habitability on Earth, namely, H2O, O3, CH4, N2O, and CH3Cl. The increase in UV dominates changes of O3, OH, CH4, N2O, and CH3Cl, whereas the increase in stellar temperature dominates changes in H2O. The overall effect as stellar effective temperatures and corresponding UV increase is a lower surface temperature of the planet due to a bigger part of the stellar flux being reflected at short wavelengths, as well as increased photolysis. Earth-like atmosphere models show more O3 and OH but less stratospheric CH4, N2O, CH3Cl, and tropospheric H2O (but more stratospheric H2O) with increasing effective temperature of main sequence stars. The corresponding detectable spectral features, on the other hand, show different detectability depending on the wavelength observed. We concentrate on directly imaged planets here as a framework to interpret future light curves, direct imaging, and secondary eclipse measurements of atmospheres of terrestrial planets in the habitable zone at varying orbital positions.