15 research outputs found

    A Circumplanetary Disk around PDS70c

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    International audiencePDS 70 is a unique system in which two protoplanets, PDS 70 b and c, have been discovered within the dust-depleted cavity of their disk, at ~22 and 34 au, respectively, by direct imaging at infrared wavelengths. Subsequent detection of the planets in the Hα line indicates that they are still accreting material through circumplanetary disks. In this Letter, we present new Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) observations of the dust continuum emission at 855 ÎŒm at high angular resolution (~20 mas, 2.3 au) that aim to resolve the circumplanetary disks and constrain their dust masses. Our observations confirm the presence of a compact source of emission co-located with PDS 70 c, spatially separated from the circumstellar disk and less extended than ~1.2 au in radius, a value close to the expected truncation radius of the circumplanetary disk at a third of the Hill radius. The emission around PDS 70 c has a peak intensity of ~86 ± 16 ÎŒJy beam-1, which corresponds to a dust mass of ~0.031 M⊕ or ~0.007 M⊕, assuming that it is only constituted of 1 ÎŒm or 1 mm sized grains, respectively. We also detect extended, low surface brightness continuum emission within the cavity near PDS 70 b. We observe an optically thin inner disk within 18 au of the star with an emission that could result from small micron-sized grains transported from the outer disk through the orbits of b and c. In addition, we find that the outer disk resolves into a narrow and bright ring with a faint inner shoulder

    Identification and mitigation of a vibrational telescope systematic with application to spitzer

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    We observed Proxima Centauri with the Spitzer Space Telescope Infrared Array Camera five times in 2016 and 2017 to search for transits of Proxima Centauri b. Following standard analysis procedures, we found three asymmetric, transit-like events that are now understood to be vibrational systematics. This systematic is correlated with the width of the point-response function (PRF), which we measure with rotated and nonrotated-Gaussian fits with respect to the detector array. We show that the systematic can be removed with a novel application of an adaptive elliptical-aperture photometry technique, and compare the performance of this technique with fixed and variable circular-aperture photometry, using both BiLinearly Interpolated Subpixel Sensitivity (BLISS) maps and nonbinned Pixel-Level Decorrelation (PLD). With BLISS maps, elliptical photometry results in a lower standard deviation of normalized residuals, and reduced or similar correlated noise when compared to circular apertures. PLD prefers variable, circular apertures, but generally results in more correlated noise than BLISS. This vibrational effect is likely present in other telescopes and Spitzer observations, where correction could improve results. Our elliptical apertures can be applied to any photometry observations, and may be even more effective when applied to more circular PRFs than Spitzer's.The authors acknowledge support from the following: CATA-Basal/Chile PB06 Conicyt and Fondecyt/Chile project #1161218 (J.S.J.). Spanish MINECO programs AYA2016-79245-C03-03-P, ESP2017-87676-C05-02-R (E.R.), ESP2016-80435-C2-2-R (E.P.) and through the “Centre of Excellence Severo Ochoa” award SEV-2017-0709 (P.J.A.,C.R.-L., E.R.). STFC Consolidated Grant ST/P000592/1 (G.A.E.). NASA Planetary Atmospheres Program grant NNX12AI69G and NASA Astrophysics Data Analysis Program grant NNX13AF38G (R.C., J.H., K.M., M.H.). Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities and the Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional (FEDER) through grant ESP2016-80435-C2-1-R and PGC2018-098153-B-C33 (I.R.)

    An ultrahot Neptune in the Neptune desert

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    About 1 out of 200 Sun-like stars has a planet with an orbital period shorter than one day: an ultrashort-period planet1,2. All of the previously known ultrashort-period planets are either hot Jupiters, with sizes above 10 Earth radii (R⊕), or apparently rocky planets smaller than 2 R⊕. Such lack of planets of intermediate size (the ‘hot Neptune desert’) has been interpreted as the inability of low-mass planets to retain any hydrogen/helium (H/He) envelope in the face of strong stellar irradiation. Here we report the discovery of an ultrashort-period planet with a radius of 4.6 R⊕ and a mass of 29 M⊕, firmly in the hot Neptune desert. Data from the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite3 revealed transits of the bright Sun-like star LTT 9779 every 0.79 days. The planet’s mean density is similar to that of Neptune, and according to thermal evolution models, it has a H/He-rich envelope constituting 9.0−2.9+2.7% of the total mass. With an equilibrium temperature around 2,000 K, it is unclear how this ‘ultrahot Neptune’ managed to retain such an envelope. Follow-up observations of the planet’s atmosphere to better understand its origin and physical nature will be facilitated by the star’s brightness (Vmag = 9.8)

    Distributions of gas and small and large grains in the LkHα 330 disk trace a young planetary system

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    Planets that are forming around young stars are expected to leave clear imprints in the distribution of the gas and dust of their parental protoplanetary disks. In this paper, we present new scattered light and millimeter observations of the protoplanetary disk around LkHα 330, using SPHERE/VLT and ALMA, respectively. The scattered-light SPHERE observations reveal an asymmetric ring at around 45 au from the star in addition to two spiral arms with similar radial launching points at around 90 au. The millimeter observations from ALMA (resolution of 0.06 3; A- 0.04 3;) mainly show an asymmetric ring located at 110 au from the star. In addition to this asymmetry, there are two faint symmetric rings at 60 au and 200 au. The 12CO, 13CO, and C18O lines seem to be less abundant in the inner disk (these observations have a resolution of 0.16 3; A- 0.11 3;). The 13CO peaks at a location similar to the inner ring observed with SPHERE, suggesting that this line is optically thick and traces variations of disk temperature instead of gas surface-density variations, while the C18O peaks slightly further away at around 60 au. We compare our observations with hydrodynamical simulations that include gas and dust evolution, and conclude that a 10 MJup mass planet at 60 au and in an eccentric orbit (e = 0.1) can qualitatively explain most of the observed structures. A planet in a circular orbit leads to a much narrower concentration in the millimeter emission, while a planet in a more eccentric orbit leads to a very eccentric cavity as well. In addition, the outer spiral arm launched by the planet changes its pitch angle along the spiral due to the eccentricity and when it interacts with the vortex, potentially appearing in observations as two distinct spirals. Our observations and models show that LkHα 330 is an interesting target to search for (eccentric-) planets while they are still embedded in their parental disk, making it an excellent candidate for studies on planet-disk interaction

    Distributions of gas and small and large grains in the LkHα 330 disk trace a young planetary system

    No full text
    Planets that are forming around young stars are expected to leave clear imprints in the distribution of the gas and dust of their parental protoplanetary disks. In this paper, we present new scattered light and millimeter observations of the protoplanetary disk around LkHα 330, using SPHERE/VLT and ALMA, respectively. The scattered-light SPHERE observations reveal an asymmetric ring at around 45 au from the star in addition to two spiral arms with similar radial launching points at around 90 au. The millimeter observations from ALMA (resolution of 0.06 3; A- 0.04 3;) mainly show an asymmetric ring located at 110 au from the star. In addition to this asymmetry, there are two faint symmetric rings at 60 au and 200 au. The 12CO, 13CO, and C18O lines seem to be less abundant in the inner disk (these observations have a resolution of 0.16 3; A- 0.11 3;). The 13CO peaks at a location similar to the inner ring observed with SPHERE, suggesting that this line is optically thick and traces variations of disk temperature instead of gas surface-density variations, while the C18O peaks slightly further away at around 60 au. We compare our observations with hydrodynamical simulations that include gas and dust evolution, and conclude that a 10 MJup mass planet at 60 au and in an eccentric orbit (e = 0.1) can qualitatively explain most of the observed structures. A planet in a circular orbit leads to a much narrower concentration in the millimeter emission, while a planet in a more eccentric orbit leads to a very eccentric cavity as well. In addition, the outer spiral arm launched by the planet changes its pitch angle along the spiral due to the eccentricity and when it interacts with the vortex, potentially appearing in observations as two distinct spirals. Our observations and models show that LkHα 330 is an interesting target to search for (eccentric-) planets while they are still embedded in their parental disk, making it an excellent candidate for studies on planet-disk interaction
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