Dusty Rings: Signposts of Recent Planet Formation
Astrophysics
2009-11-07 v1
Abstract
Many nearby stars are surrounded by a bright ring or disk of cold dust. Our calculations show that these disks and rings of dust are signposts of recent planet formation. Bright rings appear because dust associated with the formation of a planet absorbs and scatters light from the central star. The calculations explain the rings observed so far and predict that all nascent solar systems have dusty rings.
Cite
@article{arxiv.astro-ph/0208155,
title = {Dusty Rings: Signposts of Recent Planet Formation},
author = {Scott J. Kenyon and Benjamin C. Bromley},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:astro-ph/0208155},
year = {2009}
}
Comments
9 pages of text, 2 black & white figures, and 2 color jpeg images. Two animations are available at http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/~kenyon/pf/sp/movies.html Accepted for the Astrophysical Journal (Letters)