Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Astrophysics and Astronomy

PDF

Swarthmore College

2015

Astrophysics - Solar and Stellar Astrophysics

Articles 1 - 1 of 1

Full-Text Articles in Physical Sciences and Mathematics

A Disk-Based Dynamical Mass Estimate For The Young Binary Ak Sco, I. Czekala, S. M. Andrews, Eric L.N. Jensen, K. G. Stassun, G. Torres, D. J. Wilner Jun 2015

A Disk-Based Dynamical Mass Estimate For The Young Binary Ak Sco, I. Czekala, S. M. Andrews, Eric L.N. Jensen, K. G. Stassun, G. Torres, D. J. Wilner

Physics & Astronomy Faculty Works

We present spatially and spectrally resolved Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) observations of gas and dust in the disk orbiting the pre-main sequence (pre-MS) binary AK Sco. By forward-modeling the disk velocity field traced by CO J = 2-1 line emission, we infer the mass of the central binary, {M}*=2.49+/- 0.10 {M}, a new dynamical measurement that is independent of stellar evolutionary models. Assuming the disk and binary are co-planar within ̃2°, this disk-based binary mass measurement is in excellent agreement with constraints from radial velocity monitoring of the combined stellar spectra. These ALMA results are …