The nature of extreme IR excesses in two solar-type stars discovered by Spitzer

Details The nature of extreme IR excesses in two solar-type stars discovered by Spitzer The nature of extreme IR excesses in two solar-type stars discovered by Spitzer

May 2007

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2007sptz.prop40227r&link_type=abstract

Spitzer Proposal ID #40227

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Scientific paper

We propose to obtain follow-up IRS spectroscopy for two members of the 30 Myr-old cluster NGC 2547 that show unusually strong infrared excess at 3.6-24 microns, based on our prior IRAC and MIPS imaging. The age of the stars in NGC 2547 corresponds to a critical epoch when rare violent impacts similar to the Moon creation event are most likely to occur. It is also an age when all known primordial accretion disks have dissipated, according to previous observations. The mid-IR excess for one of the proposed objects - solar-type member ID8 - may be a result of a recent massive planetesimal collision. It may also be one of the rare transitional disks where the outer regions of a primordial disk remain optically thick but the inner few AU have been rendered optically thin or completely cleared, for example by planetesimal growth or planet formation. The other object, ID9, is a later-type cluster member whose spectral energy distribution implies optically thick dust emission at a range of temperatures, similar to that seen around younger classical T Tauri stars; if confirmed, it would be by far the oldest known object of this type. We will use the mid-infrared spectra to constrain the dust temperature(s), composition, and grain size distribution from the continuum shape and 10 and 18 micron silicate emission features. By comparing the spectra of ID8 and ID9 to known classical T Tauri and debris disks, as well as to the dusty envelopes of evolved stars, we will be able to resolve the nature of the unusual excesses around these solar-type stars. If these are indeed protoplanetary disks, they will provide unprecedented new laboratories for understanding disk evolution and planet formation processes.

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