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Correlation in the emission of carbon-bearing species with dynamical state of protoplanetary disks Felipe Alarcón Peña Postdoctoral Researcher - UNVEIL ERC StG Group ESO - 12/03/2025
Öberg & Bergin 2020 There are major processes occurring during star and planet formation. The main research goals are: ● Understand such changes and processes. ● Characterize the chemical composition in circumstellar material. ● Is there some key feature that we can detect and link to gas giants or terrestrial world composition? ● Linking dynamics and chemistry. Understanding chemistry in planet formation?
Öberg & Bergin 2020 There are major processes occurring during star and planet formation. The main research goals are: ● Understand such changes and processes. ● Characterize the chemical composition in circumstellar material. ● Is there some key feature that we can detect and link to gas giants or terrestrial world composition? ● Linking dynamics and chemistry. Understanding chemistry in planet formation?
Introduction Substructures and asymmetries in particular are somewhat common in protoplanetary disks. In the dust emission: 1. Spirals 2. Rings 3. Horseshoes 4. Dust Clumps Andrews 2020
Introduction Substructures and asymmetries in particular are somewhat common in protoplanetary disks. In line emission(gas): HD 100546, Booth+2024, Leemker+2024
Introduction Substructures and asymmetries in particular are somewhat common in protoplanetary disks. In line emission(gas): IRS 48, Booth+2024
Is it then natural to ask if dynamically active/excited disks may have consequences or footprints in the disk chemical evolution. WHY? Dynamically active disks imply: 1. The presence of additional heating sources. 2. Transport of material/ chemical mixing. 3. Abrupt and sudden changes in the physical parameters (Temperature, Radiation Fields, Density).
Exploring the link using the ExoALMA sample The ExoALMA team reported the level of asymmetry in the dust continuum data. We used ancillary data to measure the level of asymmetry in the gas emission by looking at a chemical tracer.
Exploring the link using the ExoALMA sample The ExoALMA team reported the level of asymmetry in the dust continuum data. We used ancillary data to measure the level of asymmetry in the gas emission by looking at a chemical tracer.
1. By having multiple lines we can retrieve the physical conditions of the gas by using rotational diagrams. 2. We use MCMC fitting to retrieve both, the column density and rotational temperature in two radial bins. 1) Comparing Physical Properties
1. By having multiple lines we can retrieve the physical conditions of the gas by using rotational diagrams. 2. We use MCMC fitting to retrieve both, the column density and rotational temperature in two radial bins. 3. We then look for correlation between disk physical properties and those retrieve in the gas, also considering the level of asymmetry. 1) Comparing Physical Properties
Retrieved Temperatures
Retrieved Column Densities
What about comparisons with the star & disk? If we take a closer look at different parameters, we see that the excitation temperature seems to follow a correlation with the effective temperature (and luminosity). Translating: The emission of H2CO seems to be driven by the luminosity of the host star in the disk.
Correlation plots
Trends so far… 1. No statistical differences between inner and outer regions of disks, based on data sensitivity. 2. Column densities fall to roughly ~⅓ to the column densities in the inner 100 au. 3. Stellar effective temperature seem to drive the excitation of formaldehyde in the inner 100 au of disks. 4. No strong correlation was found with other known stellar parameters.
2) Comparing Non-Axisymmetric Indices We compare the Non-Axisymmetric Index(NAI) reported by the ExoALMA survey (Curone+) with the one calculated from the H2CO emission.
2) Comparing Non-Axisymmetric Indices We compare the Non-Axisymmetric Index(NAI) reported by the ExoALMA survey (Curone+) with the one calculated from the H2CO emission.
Conclusions ● The NAI does not show strong correlation with the explored physical parameters. ● Formaldehyde emission traces different gas reservoirs based on the stellar effective temperature ● The spatial distribution of formaldehyde is still intriguing. In some cases it shows strong emission anticorrelated with the location of dust traps, while in other cases it shows the opposite behavior, i.e., no emission at all at the location of dust traps.
