Faculty Award for Women - Energetic Winds and Disk Accretionin Low Mass Young Stars

女性教师奖 - 低质量年轻恒星的能量风和盘吸积

• 批准号: 9023554
• 负责人: Suzan Edwards
• 金额: $ 25万
• 依托单位: Smith College
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 1991
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 1991-11-01 至 1998-04-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=9023554&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Faculty; Award; Women; Energetic; Winds

This faculty award for Women Scientists and Engineers is made to Dr. Suzan Edwards of the Five College Astronomy Department at Smith College. The NSF Faculty Award for Women Scientists and Engineers recognizes the high quality of the awardee's record in teaching and scholarship as well as the potential for continued significant contributions to scientific research, the academic profession, and the education of future scientists. Dr. Edwards will carry out research on energetic winds and disk accretion in low mass young stars. Current observational and theoretical work on star formation suggests that the gravitational collapse of dense, rotating cores in molecular clouds results in an initial configuration of a protostar which is dominated by a flattened spinning disk of roughly solar system dimension. During the first hundred thousand years, the simultaneous processes of mass infall onto the outer part of the disk and accretion of material through the disk and onto the central stellar object are hidden from direct view by the opaque screen provided by dust in the infalling remnant core material. Very early in this process, however, observations show that the protostellar system turns on an energetic bipolar wind. While the driving mechanism for this wind is not yet understood, theoretical arguments suggest that such a wind is required in order for the central object to shed sufficient angular momentum to grow to stellar dimensions. After several hundred thousand years, the energetic wind has removed enough of the remnant infalling core material that the star/energetic wind/accretion disk system becomes optically revealed as a T Tauri "star". A high resolution optical spectroscopic survey of T Tauri systems will be carried out at the 4m telescope at Kitt Peak National Observatory in a double-pronged study to investigate atomic lines formed in two distinct regions. Data from Observations of spectral lines formed in the energetic winds will be used to probe the wind origin and collimation mechanism, and to better constrain wind mass loss rates. Observations of lines formed in regions where mass accretion onto the stellar surface is occurring will be used to determine whether mass transfer from disk to star is conducted through a classical equatorial boundary layer or whether the stellar magnetic field interrupts the disk and channels disk material along field lines to the stellar surface.

这一教师奖授予女科学家和女工程师，颁发给史密斯学院五学院天文学系的苏珊·爱德华兹博士。NSF女科学家和女工程师学院奖表彰了获奖者在教学和学术方面的高质量记录，以及继续为科学研究、学术职业和未来科学家的教育做出重大贡献的潜力。爱德华兹博士将对低质量年轻恒星中的高能风和盘吸积进行研究。目前关于恒星形成的观测和理论工作表明，分子云中致密、旋转的核心的引力坍塌导致了原恒星的初始构型，其主要由大约太阳系尺寸的扁平旋转圆盘主导。在最初的十万年里，物质流入盘片外部和物质通过盘片吸积到中央恒星物体的同时过程，被流入的残余核心物质中的尘埃提供的不透明屏蔽物所掩盖，看不见。然而，在这个过程的非常早期，观测显示原恒星系统开启了一种能量很高的两极风。虽然这种风的驱动机制还不清楚，但理论论证表明，为了让中心物体释放足够的角动量，使其增长到恒星维度，这样的风是必要的。几十万年后，高能风带走了足够多残留下来的核心物质，使得恒星/高能风/吸积盘系统变成了光学上揭示的T-Tauri“恒星”。基特峰国家天文台的4米望远镜将对T Tauri系统进行高分辨率光学光谱测量，这是一项双管齐下的研究，目的是调查在两个不同区域形成的原子线。对高能风中形成的谱线的观测数据将被用来探索风的起源和准直机制，并更好地约束风的质量损失率。对在恒星表面发生质量吸积的区域形成的谱线的观测将用于确定从圆盘到恒星的质量转移是否通过经典的赤道边界层进行，或者恒星磁场是否中断了圆盘并沿着场线将圆盘材料引导到恒星表面。