Protostars and Planets VI, Heidelberg, July 15-20, 2013
Poster 2S059
The Evolution of Protoplanetary Disks in T Tauri Binary Systems
Daemgen, Sebastian (Department of Astronomy & Astrophysics, University of Toronto, Canada)
Petr-Gotzens, Monika (European Southern Observatory, Garching, Germany)
Correia, Serge (Institute for Astronomy, University of Hawaii, USA)
Teixeira, Paula (Institute for Astronomy, University of Vienna, Austria)
Brandner, Wolfgang (MPIA Heidelberg, Germany)
Kley, Wilhelm (Institut fuer Astronomy & Astrophysik, Universitaet Tuebingen, Germany)
Zinnecker, Hans (SOFIA Science Center, NASA-Ames Research Center, USA, & Deutsches SOFIA Institut, Universitaet Stuttgart, Germany)
Abstract:
Binaries are the most common outcome of star formation. However, the impact of binarity on the evolution of primordial circumstellar disks, which are the birthplaces of planets, is currently only little constrained by theory and observations. Consequently, star and planet formation in binary systems may be significantly different from that in single stars.
We present results from the largest coherent study of the evolution of circumstellar disks around the components of binary stars to date. 52 binaries were observed in the Orion Nebula Cluster and Chamaeleon I star-forming regions with near-infrared photometry and spectroscopy. We quantify the presence of circumstellar accretion and dust disks around the individual components of low-mass binary stars with respect to their inferred stellar (e.g. mass, luminosity, Teff), binary (binary separation, mass ratio), and cluster parameters (age, stellar density, presence of strong ionizing sources, star formation history).
The results imply significantly reduced disk lifetimes when close, <100AU, stellar companions are present. This effect appears most pronounced for the less massive component of a stellar binary. At the same time, the measured mass accretion rates are of similar magnitude as those of single stars in the same cluster and other star forming regions - a counter-intuitive result because disk masses are typically smaller than around single stars and disk life-times do not appear to be shorter by the same amount. Since the studied individual components\' circumstellar disks are potential birth places of planets, these results help to explain the peculiarities of the growing population of planets found in orbit around components of stellar multiples.
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