2015/05/06 by Brendan P. Bowler, Sean M. Andrews, Adam L. Kraus +5 · 3 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Accretion (finance) #Accretion disc #Astronomy and Astrophysical Research #Astrophysical Phenomena and Observations #Astrophysics and Star Formation Studies #Low Mass #Mass ratio #Photometry (optics) #Planet #Planetary mass #Thermal #astro-ph.EP
paper · pdf · doi:10.1088/2041-8205/805/2/l17
Accepted to ApJL
arxiv created 2015/05/06 · openalex publication_date 2015/05/28 · arxiv updated 2015/06/03 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
We present Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) observations of GSC 6214-210 A and B, a solar-mass member of the 5–10 Myr Upper Scorpius association with a 15 ± 2 M Jup companion orbiting at AU (2 2). Previous photometry and spectroscopy spanning 0.3–5 μ m revealed optical and thermal excess as well as strong H α and Pa β emission originating from a circum-substellar accretion disk around GSC 6214-210 B, making it the lowest-mass companion with unambiguous evidence of a subdisk. Despite ALMA's unprecedented sensitivity and angular resolution, neither component was detected in our 880 μ m (341 GHz) continuum observations down to a 3 σ limit of 0.22 mJy/beam. The corresponding constraints on the dust mass and total mass are <0.15 M ⨁ and <0.05 M Jup , respectively, or <0.003% and <0.3% of the mass of GSC 6214-210 B itself assuming a 100:1 gas-to-dust ratio and characteristic dust temperature of 10–20 K. If the host star possesses a putative circum-stellar disk then at most it is a meager 0.0015% of the primary mass, implying that giant planet formation has certainly ceased in this system. Considering these limits and its current accretion rate, GSC 6214-210 B appears to be at the end stages of assembly and is not expected to gain any appreciable mass over the next few megayears.