Skip to main content
SearchLoginLogin or Signup

Producing Moderate Stellar Obliquity through Planet Formation in Broken, Misaligned Protoplanetary Disks

Presentation #103.01 in the session Planetary Transactions of Angular Momentum.

Published onApr 25, 2022
Producing Moderate Stellar Obliquity through Planet Formation in Broken, Misaligned Protoplanetary Disks

Recent observational evidence has suggested that planet-forming disks exhibit a wider range of dynamical states than has generally been considered under standard planet formation hypotheses. Simultaneously, observations of stellar obliquities with respect to nearby, transiting exoplanets show that mature systems populate a wide range in parameter space. We investigate the dynamical modes that can be attained by planets that form in broken protoplanetary disks, and how this mechanism fits into the distribution of measured stellar obliquities. Using a Hamiltonian framework, we describe how the initial disk geometry and disk dispersal will affect the final stellar obliquity with respect to exoplanets forming in the inner disk. Inspired by the recent observational census of disks, we consider planet-forming disks that include at least one gap and some difference in the direction of orbital angular momenta between the disk components. We find that for a subset of systems around cool stars, an initially broken, misaligned disk can produce a moderate (5–30 degrees) range of stellar obliquities.

Comments
0
comment
No comments here