graduate

The end of runaway accretion and the final mass of gas giants

TYPEAstrophysics Seminar
Speaker:Sivan Ginzburg
Affiliation:UC Berkeley
Date:17.04.2019
Time:14:30 - 15:30
Location:Lidow 620
Abstract:

Giant planets grow by accreting gas from circumstellar disks that surround young stars. Why would this process stop at a Jupiter, or any other mass? One option is that gas accretion is regulated by a gap (annular density cavity) in the disk. I will revisit this idea using modern gap-opening theory and present a closed-form expression for the final mass of gas giants. If time permits, I will also explain how this theory can be used to interpret recent observations of accreting exoplanets that are still embedded in a gas disk.