Spitzer IRS Observations of Edge-on Protoplanetary Disks and Infrared Companions

Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astronomy

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Scientific paper

Lahuis et al. (2006) showed that Spitzer IRS observations of gas phase molecular absorption toward young stars could be used to determine physical conditions within a few AU of the star. The pencil beam nature of this method requires an edge-on disk geometry with a large column between the observer and the emitting source. Molecular gas absorption has also been detected towards GV Tau N, a classical infrared companion (Koresko et al. 1997) that is likely a circumstellar disk seen near edge-on (Correia et al. 2007). We were granted time with Spitzer IRS to obtain high signal-to-noise spectra of 7 YSOs, three classified as disks seen near edge-on and four classical IRCs, to search for molecular absorption. We present findings from this Spitzer IRS project, along with near-infrared spectroscopy of CO fundamental transitions and mid-infrared imaging. We find that although DG Tau B shows CO2 gas absorption at a temperature similar to IRS 46 and GV Tau N, it likely originates from a moderately different region of the disk, indicating that the detection of organic molecules, even in edge-on disks, is highly sensitive to the line of sight. We further find DG Tau B likely displays high amounts of dust grain growth and settling, and we provide support for the VV CrA binary disk geometry where the absorption seen towards the IRC is due to the disk around the Primary being in the line of sight (Smith et al. 2009). This work is supported by NSF grant AST-0708074 and NASA support for Spitzer observations through contract RSA No. 1346810, issued by JPL.

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