Observations of the beta Pictoris Circumstellar Disk with the Adaptive Optics Coronagraph

Details Observations of the beta Pictoris Circumstellar Disk with the Adaptive Optics Coronagraph Observations of the beta Pictoris Circumstellar Disk with the Adaptive Optics Coronagraph

May 1992

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1992aas...180.3808g&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society, 180th AAS Meeting, #38.08; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 24, p.789

Physics

Optics

2

Scientific paper

V and R band images of the circumstellar dust disk around the A5V star beta Pictoris were obtained with the JHU Adaptive Optics Coronagraph (AOC) and the 2.54 m DuPont telescope at Las Campanas in December, 1991. The images were recorded in photometric conditions using occulting masks of radius 2'' and 3'' (corresponding to distances 33 and 50 AU from beta Pic). Previously published coronagraphic images of the disk (Smith & Terrile 1984; Paresce & Burrows 1987) revealed a steeply increasing disk brightness (~ r(-4) ) up to 6'' (100 AU) from the star. Some models of the disk suggest an inner clearing zone within ~ 30 AU of the star, possibly due to planetary accretion. Our images indicate a continuing increase in disk surface brightness, i.e., no evidence of a clearing zone, up to ~ 45 AU. (Within this distance, photometry becomes unreliable, due to control star subtraction residuals.) At this distance, the R band surface brightness at the disk midplane is 14.5 mag arcsec(-2) . We also report a surface brightness of 15.3 mag arcsec(-2) at 100 AU, an increase of 0.7 mag over that reported by Smith & Terrile (1984) and Paresce & Burrows (1987). This discrepancy is likely due to better image resolution provided by the AOC image motion compensation system.

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