The Far-Ultraviolet Spectra of TW Hya. II. Models of H2 Fluorescence in a Disk

Details The Far-Ultraviolet Spectra of TW Hya. II. Models of H2 Fluorescence in a Disk The Far-Ultraviolet Spectra of TW Hya. II. Models of H2 Fluorescence in a Disk

2004-02-10

arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0402238v1

Astrophys.J. 607 (2004) 369-383

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astrophysics

Accepted by ApJ. 26 pages, 17 figures, 6 tables

Scientific paper

10.1086/383340

We measure the temperature of warm gas at planet-forming radii in the disk around the classical T Tauri star (CTTS) TW Hya by modelling the H2 fluorescence observed in HST/STIS and FUSE spectra. Strong Ly-alpha emission irradiates a warm disk surface within 2 AU of the central star and pumps certain excited levels of H2. We simulate a 1D plane-parallel atmosphere to estimate fluxes for the 140 observed H2 emission lines and to reconstruct the Ly-alpha emission profile incident upon the warm H2. The excitation of H2 can be determined from relative line strengths by measuring self-absorption in lines with low-energy lower levels, or by reconstructing the Ly-alpha profile incident upon the warm H2 using the total flux from a single upper level and the opacity in the pumping transition. Based on those diagnostics, we estimate that the warm disk surface has a column density of log N(H2)=18.5^{+1.2}_{-0.8}, a temperature T=2500^{+700}_{-500} K, and a filling factor of H2, as seen by the source of Ly-alpha emission, of 0.25\pm0.08 (all 2-sigma error bars). TW Hya produces approximately 10^{-3} L_\odot in the FUV, about 85% of which is in the Ly-alpha emission line. From the H I absorption observed in the Ly-alpha emission, we infer that dust extinction in our line of sight to TW Hya is negligible.

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