A Tale of Two Grains: Impact of Grain Size on Ring Formation via Nonideal Magnetohydrodynamic Processes

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

6-3-2021

Publication Title

Astrophysical Journal

Volume

913

First page number:

1

Last page number:

10

Abstract

Substructures in protoplanetary disks (PPDs), whose ubiquity was unveiled by recent Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array observations, are widely discussed regarding their possible origins. We carry out global 2D magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulations in axisymmetry, coupled with self-consistent ray-tracing radiative transfer, thermochemistry, and nonideal MHD diffusivities. The abundance profiles of grains are also calculated based on the global dust evolution calculation, including sintering effects. We found that dust size plays a crucial role in the ring formation around the snow lines of PPDs through the accretion process. Disk ionization structures and thus tensorial conductivities depend on the size of grains. When grains are significantly larger than polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), the nonideal MHD conductivities change dramatically across each snow line of major volatiles, leading to a sudden change in the accretion process across the snow lines and the subsequent formation of gaseous rings/gaps there. Specific layout of magnetic fields can suppress wind launching in certain regions by canceling out different stress components. On the other hand, the variations of conductivities are a lot less with only PAH-sized grains in disks and then these disks retain smoother radial density profiles across snow lines.

Disciplines

Physical Processes | Stars, Interstellar Medium and the Galaxy

Language

English

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