2006/11/14 by J. A. Eisner, E. I. Chiang, B. F. Lane +1 · 1 citation
Engineering · Physics and Astronomy · #Adhesion, Friction, and Surface Interactions #Astronomy and Astrophysical Research #Astrophysics and Star Formation Studies #astro-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1086/510833
published as Astrophys.J.657:347-358,2007 · 29 pages, including 7 figures. Accepted by ApJ
arxiv created 2006/11/14 · openalex publication_date 2007/03/01 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/31
We use spectrally dispersed near-IR interferometry data to constrain the temperature profiles of sub-AU-sized regions of 11 Herbig Ae/Be sources. We find that a single-temperature ring does not reproduce the data well. Rather, models incorporating radial temperature gradients are preferred. These gradients may arise in a dusty disk, or may reflect separate gas and dust components with different temperatures and spatial distributions. Comparison of our models with broadband spectral energy distributions suggests the latter explanation. The data support the view that the near-IR emission of Herbig Ae/Be sources arises from hot circumstellar dust and gas in sub-AU-sized disk regions. Intriguingly, our derived temperature gradients appear systematically steeper for disks around higher mass stars. It is not clear, however, whether this reflects trends in relative dust/gas contributions or gradients within individual components.