Turbulence is expected to transport angular momentum and drive mass accretion in protoplanetary disks. One way to directly measure turbulent motion in disks is through molecular line broadening. DM Tau is one of only a few disks with claimed detection of nonthermal line broadening of 0.25cs-0.33cs, where cs is the sound speed. Using the radiative transfer code mcfost within a Bayesian inference framework that evaluates over five million disk models to efficiently sample the parameter space, we fit high-resolution ( 0.'' 15 , 28 m s-1) 12CO J = 3-2 observations of DM Tau from the exoALMA Large Program. This approach enables us to simultaneously constrain the disk structure and kinematics, revealing a significant nonthermal contribution to the line width of similar to 0.4cs, inconsistent with purely thermal motions. Using the CO-based disk structure as a starting point, we reproduce the CS J = 7-6 emission well, demonstrating that the CS (which is more sensitive to nonthermal motions than CO) agrees with the turbulence inferred from the CO fit. Establishing a well-constrained background disk model further allows us to identify residual structures in the moment maps that deviate from the expected emission, revealing localized perturbations that may trace forming planets. This framework provides a powerful general approach for extracting disk structure and nonthermal broadening directly from molecular line data and can be applied to other disks with high-quality observations.

exoALMA. XIX. Confirmation of Non-thermal Line Broadening in the DM Tau Protoplanetary Disk / C. Hardiman, C. Pinte, D.J. Price, T. Hilder, I. Hammond, T. Danilovich, S.M. Andrews, R. Teague, G. Rosotti, M. Flock, G. Cataldi, J. Bae, M. Barraza-Alfaro, M. Benisty, N. Cuello, P. Curone, I. Czekala, S. Facchini, D. Fasano, M. Fukagawa, M. Galloway-Sprietsma, H. Garg, C. Hall, J. Huang, J.D. Ilee, A.F. Izquierdo, K. Kanagawa, G. Lesur, G. Lodato, C. Longarini, R. Loomis, F. Menard, R. Orihara, J. Stadler, H. Yen, G.W. Fernandez, D.J. Wilner, A.J. Winter, L. Wölfer, T.C. Yoshida, B. Zawadzki. - In: THE ASTROPHYSICAL JOURNAL LETTERS. - ISSN 2041-8205. - 997:2(2026), pp. L47.1-L47.14. [10.3847/2041-8213/ae313a]

exoALMA. XIX. Confirmation of Non-thermal Line Broadening in the DM Tau Protoplanetary Disk

G. Rosotti;P. Curone;S. Facchini;G. Lodato;C. Longarini;
2026

Abstract

Turbulence is expected to transport angular momentum and drive mass accretion in protoplanetary disks. One way to directly measure turbulent motion in disks is through molecular line broadening. DM Tau is one of only a few disks with claimed detection of nonthermal line broadening of 0.25cs-0.33cs, where cs is the sound speed. Using the radiative transfer code mcfost within a Bayesian inference framework that evaluates over five million disk models to efficiently sample the parameter space, we fit high-resolution ( 0.'' 15 , 28 m s-1) 12CO J = 3-2 observations of DM Tau from the exoALMA Large Program. This approach enables us to simultaneously constrain the disk structure and kinematics, revealing a significant nonthermal contribution to the line width of similar to 0.4cs, inconsistent with purely thermal motions. Using the CO-based disk structure as a starting point, we reproduce the CS J = 7-6 emission well, demonstrating that the CS (which is more sensitive to nonthermal motions than CO) agrees with the turbulence inferred from the CO fit. Establishing a well-constrained background disk model further allows us to identify residual structures in the moment maps that deviate from the expected emission, revealing localized perturbations that may trace forming planets. This framework provides a powerful general approach for extracting disk structure and nonthermal broadening directly from molecular line data and can be applied to other disks with high-quality observations.
Settore PHYS-05/A - Astrofisica, cosmologia e scienza dello spazio
   Unveiling the infancy of planetary systems (UNVEIL)
   UNVEIL
   EUROPEAN COMMISSION
   101076613

   Probing the Origin of Planetary Systems (POPS)
   POPS
   MINISTERO DELL'UNIVERSITA' E DELLA RICERCA
   2022YP5ACE_001
2026
Article (author)
File in questo prodotto:
File Dimensione Formato  
Hardiman_2026_ApJL_997_L47.pdf

accesso aperto

Tipologia: Publisher's version/PDF
Licenza: Creative commons
Dimensione 10.65 MB
Formato Adobe PDF
10.65 MB Adobe PDF Visualizza/Apri
Pubblicazioni consigliate

I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.

Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/2434/1217376
Citazioni
  • ???jsp.display-item.citation.pmc??? ND
  • Scopus ND
  • ???jsp.display-item.citation.isi??? 2
  • OpenAlex ND
social impact