Infrared Studies of Circumstellar Dust in Planet-Forming Exo-Systems

该奖项是根据2009年美国复苏和再投资法案（公法111-5）资助的。约翰霍普金斯大学的凯里利塞博士将调查年轻恒星周围小行星、彗星和行星体的形成和演化。这项研究将比较星周盘尘埃的中红外观测与太阳系彗星、行星际尘埃和陨石的行星天文学研究。 他将专注于确定物质（包括水冰和多环芳烃）的位置，数量，矿物学和元素组成，以推断产生尘埃的母体的组成，位置和最小质量。目标是了解这些年轻太阳系的演化过程，并确定有助于创建更好的太阳系形成模型的参数。新光谱清单中包括一个100万年前的系统，其光谱特征与彗星相似;一个处于地球行星形成年龄的系统;一个显示超高速撞击光谱特征的系统，如形成月球或剥离水星表层的撞击;一个“成熟的”系统，有着像星际介质中那样的非常原始的尘埃，这表明那里没有发生高温处理和径向混合。利塞博士还将把赫歇尔太空望远镜的结果结合起来，以改进磁盘外部冰冷尘埃的模型，同时为詹姆斯韦伯太空望远镜使命在未来十年内对这些和其他系统进行解析光谱成像铺平道路。将与来自大型望远镜和即将到来的阿塔卡马大型毫米波阵列天文台的地面光学/红外图像进行连接。这些新的数据集将有助于限制星周物质的位置，改善尘埃成分和质量的确定，母体的分类以及对尘埃的物理过程。

This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5).Dr. Carey Lisse of Johns Hopkins University will investigate the formation and evolution of asteroids, comets, and planetary bodies around young stars. The research will compare mid-infrared observations of dust in circumstellar disks to planetary astronomy studies of solar system comets, interplanetary dust, and meteorites. He will focus on determining the location, amount, and mineralogical and elemental composition of the material (including water ice and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons) to infer the composition, location, and minimum mass of the parent bodies producing the dust. The goal is to obtain an understanding of the evolutionary processes in these young solar systems, and to determine parameters that will aid in the creation of better models of solar system formation. Included in the list of new spectra are a 1 million year old system with a spectral signature like that of comets; a system at the right age for terrestrial planet formation; one showing spectral signatures of hypervelocity impacts like the ones that formed the Moon or stripped Mercury of its surface layers; and a 'mature' system with very primitive dust like that in the interstellar medium, suggesting that the high temperature processing and radial mixing did not occur there. Dr. Lisse will also incorporate results from the Herschel Space Telescope to improve models of cold, icy dust in the outer parts of disk, while preparing the way for resolved spectral imaging of these and other systems by the James Webb Space Telescope mission in the next decade. Connections will be made with ground based optical/infra-red imagery from large telescopes and the upcoming Atacama Large Millimeter Array observatory. These new datasets will help constrain the location of the circumstellar material, improving the determination of the dust composition and mass, the taxonomy of the parent bodies, and the physical processes operating on the dust.