Formation of Giant Planets by Fragmentation of Protoplanetary Disks
Lucio Mayer,1*
Thomas Quinn,1*
James Wadsley,2
Joachim Stadel3
The evolution of gravitationally unstable
protoplanetary gaseous disks has been studied with the use of
three-dimensional smoothed particle hydrodynamics simulations with
unprecedented resolution. We have considered disks with initial masses
and temperature profiles consistent with those inferred for the
protosolar nebula and for other protoplanetary disks. We show that
long-lasting, self-gravitating protoplanets arise after a few disk
orbital periods if cooling is efficient enough to maintain the
temperature close to 50 K. The resulting bodies have masses and orbital
eccentricities similar to those of detected extrasolar planets.
1 Department of Astronomy, University of
Washington, Seattle, WA 98195, USA.
2 Department of
Physics & Astronomy, McMaster University, 1280 Main St. West, Hamilton,
ON L8S 4M1, Canada.
3 University of Victoria,
Department of Physics and Astronomy, 3800 Finnerty Road, Elliot
Building, Victoria, BC V8W 3PG, Canada.
*
To whom correspondence should be addressed.
E-mail: lucio{at}physik.unizh.ch,
trq{at}astro.washington.edu
Present address: Institute of Theoretical Physics, University
of Zurich, Winterthurerstrasse 190, CH-8057 Zurich, Switzerland.
