Journal
PUBLICATIONS OF THE ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY OF JAPAN
Volume 64, Issue 6, Pages -Publisher
OXFORD UNIV PRESS
DOI: 10.1093/pasj/64.6.124
Keywords
(stars:) planetary systems: protoplanetary disk; techniques: high angular resolution; techniques: polarimetric
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Funding
- JSPS-DST
- Princeton University Global Collaborative Research Fund grant
- World Premier International Research Center Initiative (WPI Initiative), MEXT, Japan
- NSF [AST-1009203]
- Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research [23103001] Funding Source: KAKEN
- Division Of Astronomical Sciences
- Direct For Mathematical & Physical Scien [1009203, 1009314, 0901967, 1008440] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
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We present H-band polarimetric imagery of UX Tau A taken with HiCIAO/AO188 on the Subaru Telescope. UX Tau A has been classified as a pre-transitional disk object, with a gap structure separating its inner and outer disks. Our imagery taken with the 0 ''.15 (21 AU) radius coronagraphic mask has revealed a strongly polarized circumstellar disk surrounding UX Tau A, which extends to 120 AU, at a spatial resolution of 0 ''.1 (14 AU). It is inclined by 46 degrees +/- 2 degrees, since the west side is nearest. Although SED modeling and sub-millimeter imagery have suggested the presence of a gap in the disk, with the inner edge of the outer disk estimated to be located at 25-30 AU, we detect no evidence of a gap at the limit of our inner working angle (23 AU) at the near-infrared wavelength. We attribute the observed strong polarization (up to 66%) to light scattering by dust grains in the disk. However, neither polarization models of the circumstellar disk based on Rayleigh-scattering nor Mie-scattering approximations were consistent with the observed azimuthal profile of the polarization degrees of the disk. Instead, a geometric optics model of the disk with nonspherical grains with radii of 30 mu m is consistent with the observed profile. We suggest that the dust grains have experienced frequent collisional coagulations, and have grown in the circumstellar disk of UX Tau A.
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