English

Faint debris disk peering through superflare light echo

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics 2022-07-20 v1 Solar and Stellar Astrophysics

Abstract

We present the detectability of strong mid-infrared (MIR) light echoes from faint debris disks illuminated by bright superflares of M-dwarf stars. Circumstellar dust grains around an M-dwarf star are simultaneously heated by superflare radiation. One can thus expect their re-emission in the MIR wavelength regime. According to our model calculations for the Proxima Centauri system, the nearest M-dwarf star system, thermal emission echos from an inner (r<1 aur < 1~{\rm au}) debris disk with a total mass down to that of the solar system's zodiacal dust are expected to emerge at wavelengths longer than 10 μm\sim 10~{\rm \mu m} with a strength comparable to or greater than a white-light superflare. Also, observable echos from inner- (r0.5 aur \lesssim 0.5~{\rm au}) debris disks irradiated by energetic (1033.5 ergs\gtrsim 10^{33.5}~{\rm ergs}) superflares of nearby (D<3 pcD < 3~{\rm pc}) M-dwarfs are expected. Our simulation results indicate that superflare monitoring using high-speed optical instruments like OASES and its prompt follow-up using ground-based MIR instruments, such as TAO/MIMIZUKU, can detect these MIR light echoes from debris disks around solar neighborhood flare stars.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2206.10851,
  title  = {Faint debris disk peering through superflare light echo},
  author = {Ko Arimatsu and Takafumi Kamizuka},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2206.10851},
  year   = {2022}
}

Comments

11 pages, 5 figures, ApJL accepted

R2 v1 2026-06-24T11:59:35.253Z