Computer Science
Scientific paper
May 2007
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2007sptz.prop40809h&link_type=abstract
Spitzer Proposal ID #40809
Computer Science
Scientific paper
A long-standing question in the theory of star formation has been the evolution of angular momentum. Most mechanisms employed to disperse the angular momentum have involved magnetic breaking in some way. In particular, a magnetic interaction between stellar magnetospheres and circumstellar disks, known as 'disk-locking,' is believed to cause the spin down of stars during the pre-main sequence (PMS) evolutionary stage. A key testable prediction of the disk-locking theory is that stars with longer rotation periods are more likely than those with short periods to have infrared excesses, indicating the presence of a circumstellar disk. We propose here to test this prediction in the young cluster NGC 2362 (age ~ 5 Myr). But at what age do stars typically decouple from their disks and begin to spin up, conserving angular momentum as they do? We will use archival IRAC flux measurements together with rotation periods that we have determined for PMS stars in this cluster to search for a correlation between mid-IR excess and rotation. We expect that there will be a lower fraction of slowly rotating stars lacking disks, as those stars that may have just been released from their disks at the age of Orion (t ~ 1 Myr), will have had time to spin up by 5 Myr. Additionally, we intend to use the Halpha emission line measurements of the stars in NGC 2362 to assess the evidence for ongoing accretion. If it is found that some of these stars are in fact still accreting gas while maintaining a mid-IR excess, our observations can constrain the timescale for the dispersal of inner disk regions, and provide critical insight to the formation mechanism of Jovian-like planets with orbital radii of less than 1 AU. With its estimated age near the empirically derived disk lifetime limit, our observations can also constrain the timescale for disk-locking by comparing them to the results seen in Orion (age ~ 1 Myr) and NGC 2264 (age ~ 2 Myr).
Hamilton-Drager Catrina
Johns-Krull Christopher
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