Spatially resolved spectroscopy of sub-au-sized regions of T tauri and Herbig AE/BE disks

J. A. Eisner, J. R. Graham, R. L. Akeson, J. Najita

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

71 Scopus citations

Abstract

We present spatially resolved near-IR spectroscopic observations of 15 young stars. Using a grism spectrometer behind the Keck interferometer, we obtained an angular resolution of a few milliarcseconds and a spectral resolution of 230, enabling probes of both gas and dust in the inner disks surrounding the target stars. We find that the angular size of the near-IR emission typically increases with wavelength, indicating hot, presumably gaseous material within the dust sublimation radius. Our data also clearly indicate Brγ emission arising from hot hydrogen gas, and suggest the presence of water vapor and carbon monoxide gas in the inner disks of several objects. This gaseous emission is more compact than the dust continuum emission in all cases. We construct simple physical models of the inner disk and fit them to our data to constrain the spatial distribution and temperature of dust and gas emission components.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)309-323
Number of pages15
JournalAstrophysical Journal
Volume692
Issue number1
DOIs
StatePublished - Feb 10 2009

Keywords

  • circumstellar matter
  • stars: individual (AS 205, AS 442, DG Tau, MWC 275, MWC 480, MWC 758, MWC 863, MWC 1080, HD 141569, HD 142666, HD 144432, RY Tau, RW Aur, V1295 Aql, VV Ser)
  • stars: pre-main sequence
  • techniques: interferometric
  • techniques: spectroscopic

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Astronomy and Astrophysics
  • Space and Planetary Science

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