A likely flyby of binary protostar Z CMa caught in action

Ruobing Dong; Hauyu Baobab Liu; Nicolás Cuello; Christophe Pinte; Péter Ábrahám; Eduard Vorobyov; Jun Hashimoto; Ágnes Kóspál; Eugene Chiang; Michihiro Takami; Lei Chen; Michael Dunham; Misato Fukagawa; Joel Green; Yasuhiro Hasegawa; Thomas Henning; Yaroslav Pavlyuchenkov; Tae Soo Pyo; Motohide Tamura

doi:10.1038/s41550-021-01558-y

A likely flyby of binary protostar Z CMa caught in action

Ruobing Dong, Hauyu Baobab Liu, Nicolás Cuello, Christophe Pinte, Péter Ábrahám, Eduard Vorobyov, Jun Hashimoto, Ágnes Kóspál, Eugene Chiang, Michihiro Takami, Lei Chen, Michael Dunham, Misato Fukagawa, Joel Green, Yasuhiro Hasegawa, Thomas Henning, Yaroslav Pavlyuchenkov, Tae Soo Pyo, Motohide Tamura

School of Physics and Astronomy

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › Research › peer-review

31 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Close encounters between young stellar objects in star-forming clusters are expected to markedly perturb circumstellar disks. Such events are witnessed in numerical simulations of star formation^1–3, but few direct observations of ongoing encounters have been made. Here we report sub-0.1″-resolution Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array and Jansky Very Large Array observations towards the million-year-old binary protostar Z Canis Majoris in dust continuum and molecular line emission. A point source ~4,700 au from the binary has been discovered at both millimetre and centimetre wavelengths. It is located along the extension of a ~2,000 au streamer structure previously found in scattered light imaging, whose counterpart in dust and gas emission is also newly identified. Comparison with simulations shows signposts of a rare flyby event in action. Z CMa is a ‘double burster’, as both binary components undergo accretion outbursts⁴, which may be facilitated by perturbations to the host disk by flybys^5–8.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	331–338
Number of pages	13
Journal	Nature Astronomy
Volume	6
Issue number	3
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1038/s41550-021-01558-y
Publication status	Published - 2022

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Dong, R., Liu, H. B., Cuello, N., Pinte, C., Ábrahám, P., Vorobyov, E., Hashimoto, J., Kóspál, Á., Chiang, E., Takami, M., Chen, L., Dunham, M., Fukagawa, M., Green, J., Hasegawa, Y., Henning, T., Pavlyuchenkov, Y., Pyo, T. S., & Tamura, M. (2022). A likely flyby of binary protostar Z CMa caught in action. Nature Astronomy, 6(3), 331–338. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41550-021-01558-y

@article{9de712a3380a4d38afd7fb4d00cfd400,

title = "A likely flyby of binary protostar Z CMa caught in action",

abstract = "Close encounters between young stellar objects in star-forming clusters are expected to markedly perturb circumstellar disks. Such events are witnessed in numerical simulations of star formation1–3, but few direct observations of ongoing encounters have been made. Here we report sub-0.1″-resolution Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array and Jansky Very Large Array observations towards the million-year-old binary protostar Z Canis Majoris in dust continuum and molecular line emission. A point source ~4,700 au from the binary has been discovered at both millimetre and centimetre wavelengths. It is located along the extension of a ~2,000 au streamer structure previously found in scattered light imaging, whose counterpart in dust and gas emission is also newly identified. Comparison with simulations shows signposts of a rare flyby event in action. Z CMa is a {\textquoteleft}double burster{\textquoteright}, as both binary components undergo accretion outbursts4, which may be facilitated by perturbations to the host disk by flybys5–8.",

author = "Ruobing Dong and Liu, {Hauyu Baobab} and Nicol{\'a}s Cuello and Christophe Pinte and P{\'e}ter {\'A}brah{\'a}m and Eduard Vorobyov and Jun Hashimoto and {\'A}gnes K{\'o}sp{\'a}l and Eugene Chiang and Michihiro Takami and Lei Chen and Michael Dunham and Misato Fukagawa and Joel Green and Yasuhiro Hasegawa and Thomas Henning and Yaroslav Pavlyuchenkov and Pyo, {Tae Soo} and Motohide Tamura",

note = "Funding Information: We thank C.-H. Kim, J. Lee and H. Deng for helpful discussions. R.D. would like to thank L. Xu for support and encouragement in the period of this work. R.D. acknowledges financial support provided by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada through a Discovery Grant, as well as the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation through a Sloan Research Fellowship. N.C. acknowledges support from the European Union{\textquoteright}s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under Marie Sk{\l}odowska-Curie grant agreement 210021. H.B.L. acknowledges support from the Ministry of Science and Technology (MoST) of Taiwan (grant 108-2112-M-001-002-MY3). E.V. acknowledges support from the Russian Fund for Fundamental Research, Russian–Taiwanese project 19-52-52011. Y.H. is supported by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. A.K. and L.C. acknowledge support from the European Research Council under the European Union{\textquoteright}s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme, grant agreement 716155 (SACCRED). L.C. is supported by the Hungarian OTKA grant K132406. M. Takami is supported by the Ministry of Science and Technology (MoST) of Taiwan (grants 106-2119-M-001-026-MY3 and 109-2112-M-001-019). H.B.L. and M.T. and are supported by MoST of Taiwan 108-2923-M-001-006-MY3 for the Taiwanese–Russian collaboration project. The Geryon cluster at the Centro de Astro-Ingenieria UC was extensively used for the calculations performed in this paper. BASAL CATA PFB-06, the Anillo ACT-86, FONDEQUIP AIC-57 and QUIMAL 130008 provided funding for several improvements to the Geryon cluster. This paper makes use of the following ALMA data: ADS/JAO.ALMA#2016.1.00110.S and #2016.2.00168.S. ALMA is a partnership of ESO (representing its member states), NSF (USA) and NINS (Japan), together with NRC (Canada), MOST and ASIAA (Taiwan) and KASI (Republic of Korea), in cooperation with the Republic of Chile. The Joint ALMA Observatory is operated by ESO, auI/NRAO and NAOJ. The National Radio Astronomy Observatory is a facility of the National Science Foundation operated under cooperative agreement by Associated Universities, Inc. Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Limited.",

year = "2022",

doi = "10.1038/s41550-021-01558-y",

language = "English",

volume = "6",

pages = "331–338",

journal = "Nature Astronomy",

issn = "2397-3366",

publisher = "Nature Publishing Group",

number = "3",

}

Dong, R, Liu, HB, Cuello, N, Pinte, C, Ábrahám, P, Vorobyov, E, Hashimoto, J, Kóspál, Á, Chiang, E, Takami, M, Chen, L, Dunham, M, Fukagawa, M, Green, J, Hasegawa, Y, Henning, T, Pavlyuchenkov, Y, Pyo, TS & Tamura, M 2022, 'A likely flyby of binary protostar Z CMa caught in action', Nature Astronomy, vol. 6, no. 3, pp. 331–338. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41550-021-01558-y

TY - JOUR

T1 - A likely flyby of binary protostar Z CMa caught in action

AU - Dong, Ruobing

AU - Liu, Hauyu Baobab

AU - Cuello, Nicolás

AU - Pinte, Christophe

AU - Ábrahám, Péter

AU - Vorobyov, Eduard

AU - Hashimoto, Jun

AU - Kóspál, Ágnes

AU - Chiang, Eugene

AU - Takami, Michihiro

AU - Chen, Lei

AU - Dunham, Michael

AU - Fukagawa, Misato

AU - Green, Joel

AU - Hasegawa, Yasuhiro

AU - Henning, Thomas

AU - Pavlyuchenkov, Yaroslav

AU - Pyo, Tae Soo

AU - Tamura, Motohide

N1 - Funding Information: We thank C.-H. Kim, J. Lee and H. Deng for helpful discussions. R.D. would like to thank L. Xu for support and encouragement in the period of this work. R.D. acknowledges financial support provided by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada through a Discovery Grant, as well as the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation through a Sloan Research Fellowship. N.C. acknowledges support from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement 210021. H.B.L. acknowledges support from the Ministry of Science and Technology (MoST) of Taiwan (grant 108-2112-M-001-002-MY3). E.V. acknowledges support from the Russian Fund for Fundamental Research, Russian–Taiwanese project 19-52-52011. Y.H. is supported by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. A.K. and L.C. acknowledge support from the European Research Council under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme, grant agreement 716155 (SACCRED). L.C. is supported by the Hungarian OTKA grant K132406. M. Takami is supported by the Ministry of Science and Technology (MoST) of Taiwan (grants 106-2119-M-001-026-MY3 and 109-2112-M-001-019). H.B.L. and M.T. and are supported by MoST of Taiwan 108-2923-M-001-006-MY3 for the Taiwanese–Russian collaboration project. The Geryon cluster at the Centro de Astro-Ingenieria UC was extensively used for the calculations performed in this paper. BASAL CATA PFB-06, the Anillo ACT-86, FONDEQUIP AIC-57 and QUIMAL 130008 provided funding for several improvements to the Geryon cluster. This paper makes use of the following ALMA data: ADS/JAO.ALMA#2016.1.00110.S and #2016.2.00168.S. ALMA is a partnership of ESO (representing its member states), NSF (USA) and NINS (Japan), together with NRC (Canada), MOST and ASIAA (Taiwan) and KASI (Republic of Korea), in cooperation with the Republic of Chile. The Joint ALMA Observatory is operated by ESO, auI/NRAO and NAOJ. The National Radio Astronomy Observatory is a facility of the National Science Foundation operated under cooperative agreement by Associated Universities, Inc. Publisher Copyright: © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Limited.

PY - 2022

Y1 - 2022

N2 - Close encounters between young stellar objects in star-forming clusters are expected to markedly perturb circumstellar disks. Such events are witnessed in numerical simulations of star formation1–3, but few direct observations of ongoing encounters have been made. Here we report sub-0.1″-resolution Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array and Jansky Very Large Array observations towards the million-year-old binary protostar Z Canis Majoris in dust continuum and molecular line emission. A point source ~4,700 au from the binary has been discovered at both millimetre and centimetre wavelengths. It is located along the extension of a ~2,000 au streamer structure previously found in scattered light imaging, whose counterpart in dust and gas emission is also newly identified. Comparison with simulations shows signposts of a rare flyby event in action. Z CMa is a ‘double burster’, as both binary components undergo accretion outbursts4, which may be facilitated by perturbations to the host disk by flybys5–8.

AB - Close encounters between young stellar objects in star-forming clusters are expected to markedly perturb circumstellar disks. Such events are witnessed in numerical simulations of star formation1–3, but few direct observations of ongoing encounters have been made. Here we report sub-0.1″-resolution Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array and Jansky Very Large Array observations towards the million-year-old binary protostar Z Canis Majoris in dust continuum and molecular line emission. A point source ~4,700 au from the binary has been discovered at both millimetre and centimetre wavelengths. It is located along the extension of a ~2,000 au streamer structure previously found in scattered light imaging, whose counterpart in dust and gas emission is also newly identified. Comparison with simulations shows signposts of a rare flyby event in action. Z CMa is a ‘double burster’, as both binary components undergo accretion outbursts4, which may be facilitated by perturbations to the host disk by flybys5–8.

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U2 - 10.1038/s41550-021-01558-y

DO - 10.1038/s41550-021-01558-y

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:85122872988

SN - 2397-3366

VL - 6

SP - 331

EP - 338

JO - Nature Astronomy

JF - Nature Astronomy

IS - 3

ER -

A likely flyby of binary protostar Z CMa caught in action

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