Author/Authors :
McCarthy، Brian C. نويسنده , , Holland، W. S. نويسنده , , Greaves، J. S. نويسنده , , Dent، W. R. F. نويسنده , , Wyatt، M. C. نويسنده , , Zuckerman، B. نويسنده , , Webb، R. A. نويسنده , , Coulson، I. M. نويسنده , , Robson، E. I. نويسنده , , Gear، W. K. نويسنده ,
Abstract :
New submillimeter images of the cold dust emission around the nearby main-sequence star Fomalhaut are presented. Observations at a wavelength of 450 (mu)m, where the telescope beam size is equivalent to a resolution of 50 AU, reveal that Fomalhaut is encircled by a significantly nonaxisymmetric inclined ring. Smooth axisymmetric models of the ring images suggest the existence of a least one "clump" with an estimated flux of about 5% of the total from the disk, thus implying a clump mass of 0.075 lunar masses. At the resolution of the data, this clump could instead be a ring arc. The most plausible explanation is that this feature is produced by dust trapped in a resonance with a large planet. The observed structures around Fomalhaut and other Vega-excess stars qualitatively resemble features seen in numerical simulations with a gas giant perturber.
Keywords :
stars , low-mass , brown dwarfs , individual (Taurus-Auriga) , open clusters and associations , stars: premain-sequence