Deep Search for a scattered light dust halo around Vega with the Hubble Space Telescope

Fuente: arXiv
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Autores principales: Wolff, Schuyler G., Gáspár, András, Rieke, George H., Leisenring, Jarron M., Su, Kate, Wilner, David, Matrà, Luca, Ygouf, Marie, Ballering, Nicholas P.
Formato: Preprint
Publicado: 2024
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author Wolff, Schuyler G.
Gáspár, András
Rieke, George H.
Leisenring, Jarron M.
Su, Kate
Wilner, David
Matrà, Luca
Ygouf, Marie
Ballering, Nicholas P.
author_facet Wolff, Schuyler G.
Gáspár, András
Rieke, George H.
Leisenring, Jarron M.
Su, Kate
Wilner, David
Matrà, Luca
Ygouf, Marie
Ballering, Nicholas P.
contents We present a provisory scattered light detection of the Vega debris disk using deep Hubble Space Telescope coronagraphy (PID 16666). At only 7.7 parsecs, Vega is immensely important in debris disk studies both for its prominence and also because it allows the highest physical resolution among all debris systems relative to temperature zones around the star. We employ the STIS coronagraph's widest wedge position and classical Reference Differential Imaging to achieve among the lowest surface brightness sensitivities to date ($\sim 4\,μJy/arcsec^{2}$) at wide separations using 32 orbits in Cycle 29. We detect a halo extending from the inner edge of our effective inner working angle at $10^{\prime\prime}.5$ out to the photon noise floor at $30^{\prime\prime}$ (80 - 230 au). The face-on orientation of the system and the lack of a perfectly color-matched PSF star have provided significant challenges to the reductions, particularly regarding artifacts from the imperfect color matching. However, we find that a halo of small dust grains provides the best explanation for the observed signal. Unlike Fomalhaut (a close twin to Vega in luminosity, distance, and age), there is no clear distinction in scattered light between the parent planetesimal belt observed with ALMA and the extended dust halo. These HST observations complement JWST GTO Cycle 1 observations of the system with NIRCam and MIRI.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2410_24042
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Deep Search for a scattered light dust halo around Vega with the Hubble Space Telescope
Wolff, Schuyler G.
Gáspár, András
Rieke, George H.
Leisenring, Jarron M.
Su, Kate
Wilner, David
Matrà, Luca
Ygouf, Marie
Ballering, Nicholas P.
Earth and Planetary Astrophysics
Solar and Stellar Astrophysics
We present a provisory scattered light detection of the Vega debris disk using deep Hubble Space Telescope coronagraphy (PID 16666). At only 7.7 parsecs, Vega is immensely important in debris disk studies both for its prominence and also because it allows the highest physical resolution among all debris systems relative to temperature zones around the star. We employ the STIS coronagraph's widest wedge position and classical Reference Differential Imaging to achieve among the lowest surface brightness sensitivities to date ($\sim 4\,μJy/arcsec^{2}$) at wide separations using 32 orbits in Cycle 29. We detect a halo extending from the inner edge of our effective inner working angle at $10^{\prime\prime}.5$ out to the photon noise floor at $30^{\prime\prime}$ (80 - 230 au). The face-on orientation of the system and the lack of a perfectly color-matched PSF star have provided significant challenges to the reductions, particularly regarding artifacts from the imperfect color matching. However, we find that a halo of small dust grains provides the best explanation for the observed signal. Unlike Fomalhaut (a close twin to Vega in luminosity, distance, and age), there is no clear distinction in scattered light between the parent planetesimal belt observed with ALMA and the extended dust halo. These HST observations complement JWST GTO Cycle 1 observations of the system with NIRCam and MIRI.
title Deep Search for a scattered light dust halo around Vega with the Hubble Space Telescope
topic Earth and Planetary Astrophysics
Solar and Stellar Astrophysics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2410.24042