Circumplanetary Disks are Rare Around Planets at Large Orbital Radii: A Parameter Survey of Flow Morphology Around Giant Planets
We investigate how the formation and structure of circumplanetary disks (CPDs) vary with planet mass and protoplanetary disk aspect ratio. Using static mesh refinement and a near-isothermal equation of state, we perform a small parameter survey of hydrodynamic simulations with parameters appropriate...
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IOP Publishing
2025-01-01
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| Series: | The Astrophysical Journal |
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| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/add934 |
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| author | Sabina Sagynbayeva Rixin Li Aleksandra Kuznetsova Zhaohuan Zhu Yan-Fei Jiang Philip J. Armitage |
| author_facet | Sabina Sagynbayeva Rixin Li Aleksandra Kuznetsova Zhaohuan Zhu Yan-Fei Jiang Philip J. Armitage |
| author_sort | Sabina Sagynbayeva |
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| description | We investigate how the formation and structure of circumplanetary disks (CPDs) vary with planet mass and protoplanetary disk aspect ratio. Using static mesh refinement and a near-isothermal equation of state, we perform a small parameter survey of hydrodynamic simulations with parameters appropriate for disk-embedded protoplanets at moderate to large orbital radii. We find that CPD formation occurs along a continuum, with “diskiness” increasing smoothly with planetary mass and decreasing disk aspect ratio. As expected from disk hydrostatic equilibrium arguments, the transition from envelope-dominated to disk-dominated structures is determined to first order by the ratio of the planetary Hill sphere radius to the disk scale height, but planets need to be significantly superthermal to host classical rotationally supported CPDs. The circularization radius of inflowing gas (as a fraction of the Hill sphere radius) shows an approximately quadratic power-law scaling with the ratio of planetary mass to the thermal mass. Compared to more physically complete radiation hydrodynamic simulations, our runs almost maximize the possibility for classical CPD formation, and hence define a plausible necessary condition for CPDs. The low abundance of detected CPDs in disks where planetary companions are inferred from substructure data may be due to a combination of the large scale height of the protoplanetary disk, and a low frequency of sufficiently massive protoplanets. Unless their CPDs cool below the local protoplanetary disk temperature, most of the wide-orbit giant planet population will be embedded in quasi-spherical envelopes that are hard to detect. Disks, and satellite systems, are more likely to form around smaller orbital separation planets. |
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| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 1538-4357 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-01-01 |
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| series | The Astrophysical Journal |
| spelling | doaj-art-87b4ab8fa8da45889f8dbda8edd563b72025-08-20T03:28:58ZengIOP PublishingThe Astrophysical Journal1538-43572025-01-01987221610.3847/1538-4357/add934Circumplanetary Disks are Rare Around Planets at Large Orbital Radii: A Parameter Survey of Flow Morphology Around Giant PlanetsSabina Sagynbayeva0https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6650-3829Rixin Li1https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9222-4367Aleksandra Kuznetsova2https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6946-6787Zhaohuan Zhu3https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3616-6822Yan-Fei Jiang4https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2624-3399Philip J. Armitage5https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5032-1396Department of Physics and Astronomy, Stony Brook University , Stony Brook, NY 11794, USADepartment of Astronomy, Theoretical Astrophysics Center, and Center for Integrative Planetary Science, University of California Berkeley , Berkeley, CA 94720-3411, USACenter for Computational Astrophysics, Flatiron Institute , 162 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010, USA; American Museum of Natural History , 200 Central Park West, New York, NY 10024, USA; Department of Physics, University of Connecticut , 196A Auditorium Road, Unit 3046, Storrs, CT 06269, USADepartment of Physics and Astronomy, University of Nevada , Las Vegas, 4505 S. Maryland Parkway, Las Vegas, NV 89154-4002, USACenter for Computational Astrophysics, Flatiron Institute , 162 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010, USADepartment of Physics and Astronomy, Stony Brook University , Stony Brook, NY 11794, USA; Center for Computational Astrophysics, Flatiron Institute , 162 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010, USAWe investigate how the formation and structure of circumplanetary disks (CPDs) vary with planet mass and protoplanetary disk aspect ratio. Using static mesh refinement and a near-isothermal equation of state, we perform a small parameter survey of hydrodynamic simulations with parameters appropriate for disk-embedded protoplanets at moderate to large orbital radii. We find that CPD formation occurs along a continuum, with “diskiness” increasing smoothly with planetary mass and decreasing disk aspect ratio. As expected from disk hydrostatic equilibrium arguments, the transition from envelope-dominated to disk-dominated structures is determined to first order by the ratio of the planetary Hill sphere radius to the disk scale height, but planets need to be significantly superthermal to host classical rotationally supported CPDs. The circularization radius of inflowing gas (as a fraction of the Hill sphere radius) shows an approximately quadratic power-law scaling with the ratio of planetary mass to the thermal mass. Compared to more physically complete radiation hydrodynamic simulations, our runs almost maximize the possibility for classical CPD formation, and hence define a plausible necessary condition for CPDs. The low abundance of detected CPDs in disks where planetary companions are inferred from substructure data may be due to a combination of the large scale height of the protoplanetary disk, and a low frequency of sufficiently massive protoplanets. Unless their CPDs cool below the local protoplanetary disk temperature, most of the wide-orbit giant planet population will be embedded in quasi-spherical envelopes that are hard to detect. Disks, and satellite systems, are more likely to form around smaller orbital separation planets.https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/add934Protoplanetary disksPlanet formationExoplanet formationHydrodynamical simulationsNatural satellite formation |
| spellingShingle | Sabina Sagynbayeva Rixin Li Aleksandra Kuznetsova Zhaohuan Zhu Yan-Fei Jiang Philip J. Armitage Circumplanetary Disks are Rare Around Planets at Large Orbital Radii: A Parameter Survey of Flow Morphology Around Giant Planets The Astrophysical Journal Protoplanetary disks Planet formation Exoplanet formation Hydrodynamical simulations Natural satellite formation |
| title | Circumplanetary Disks are Rare Around Planets at Large Orbital Radii: A Parameter Survey of Flow Morphology Around Giant Planets |
| title_full | Circumplanetary Disks are Rare Around Planets at Large Orbital Radii: A Parameter Survey of Flow Morphology Around Giant Planets |
| title_fullStr | Circumplanetary Disks are Rare Around Planets at Large Orbital Radii: A Parameter Survey of Flow Morphology Around Giant Planets |
| title_full_unstemmed | Circumplanetary Disks are Rare Around Planets at Large Orbital Radii: A Parameter Survey of Flow Morphology Around Giant Planets |
| title_short | Circumplanetary Disks are Rare Around Planets at Large Orbital Radii: A Parameter Survey of Flow Morphology Around Giant Planets |
| title_sort | circumplanetary disks are rare around planets at large orbital radii a parameter survey of flow morphology around giant planets |
| topic | Protoplanetary disks Planet formation Exoplanet formation Hydrodynamical simulations Natural satellite formation |
| url | https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/add934 |
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