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We present the results from an Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) 1.3 mm continuum and¹²CO (J= 2 − 1) line survey spread over 10 deg²in the Serpens star-forming region of 320 young stellar objects, 302 of which are likely members of Serpens (16 Class I, 35 flat-spectrum, 235 Class II, and 16 Class III). From the continuum data, we derive disk dust masses and show that they systematically decline from Class I to flat-spectrum to Class II sources. Grouped by stellar evolutionary state, the disk mass distributions are similar to other young (<3 Myr) regions, indicating that the large-scale environment of a star-forming region does not strongly affect its overall disk dust mass properties. These comparisons between populations reinforce previous conclusions that disks in the Ophiuchus star-forming region have anomalously low masses at all evolutionary stages. Additionally, we find a single deeply embedded protostar that has not been documented elsewhere in the literature and, from the CO line data, 15 protostellar outflows, which we catalog here.

 

Since Protostars and Planets VI (PPVI), our knowledge of the global properties of protoplanetary and debris disks, as well as of young stars, has dramatically improved. At the time of PPVI, mm-observations and optical to near-infrared spectroscopic surveys were largely limited to the Taurus star-forming region, especially of its most massive disk and stellar population. Now, near-complete surveys of multiple star-forming regions cover both spectroscopy of young stars and mm interferometry of their protoplanetary disks. This provides an unprecedented statistical sample of stellar masses and mass accretion rates, as well as disk masses and radii, for almost 1000 young stellar objects within 300 pc from us, while also sampling different evolutionary stages, ages, and environments. At the same time, surveys of debris disks are revealing the bulk properties of this class of more evolved objects. This chapter reviews the statistics of these measured global star and disk properties and discusses their constraints on theoretical models describing global disk evolution. Our comparisons of observations to theoretical model predictions extends beyond the traditional viscous evolution framework to include analytical descriptions of magnetic wind effects. Finally, we discuss how recent observational results can provide a framework for models of planet population synthesis and planet formation. 

We performed a comprehensive demographic study of the CO extent relative to dust of the disk population in the Lupus clouds in order to find indications of dust evolution and possible correlations with other disk properties. We increased the number of disks of the region with measured R CO and R dust from observations with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array to 42, based on the gas emission in the 12 CO J = 2−1 rotational transition and large dust grains emission at ~0.89 mm. The CO integrated emission map is modeled with an elliptical Gaussian or Nuker function, depending on the quantified residuals; the continuum is fit to a Nuker profile from interferometric modeling. The CO and dust sizes, namely the radii enclosing a certain fraction of the respective total flux (e.g., R 68% ), are inferred from the modeling. The CO emission is more extended than the dust continuum, with a R 68% CO / R 68% dust median value of 2.5, for the entire population and for a subsample with high completeness. Six disks, around 15% of the Lupus disk population, have a size ratio above 4. Based on thermo-chemical modeling, this value can only be explained if the disk has undergone grain growth and radial drift. These disks do not have unusual properties, and their properties spread across the population’s ranges of stellar mass ( M ⋆ ), disk mass ( M disk ), CO and dust sizes ( R CO , R dust ), and mass accretion of the entire population. We searched for correlations between the size ratio and M ⋆ , M disk , R CO , and R dust : only a weak monotonic anticorrelation with the R dust is found, which would imply that dust evolution is more prominent in more compact dusty disks. The lack of strong correlations is remarkable: the sample covers a wide range of stellar and disk properties, and the majority of the disks have very similar size ratios. This result suggests that the bulk of the disk population may behave alike and be in a similar evolutionary stage, independent of the stellar and disk properties. These results should be further investigated, since the optical depth difference between CO and dust continuum might play a major role in the observed size ratios of the population. Lastly, we find a monotonic correlation between the CO flux and the CO size. The results for the majority of the disks are consistent with optically thick emission and an average CO temperature of around 30 K; however, the exact value of the temperature is difficult to constrain. 

ABSTRACT We present 1.3 mm continuum ALMA long-baseline observations at 3–5 au resolution of 10 of the brightest discs from the Ophiuchus DIsc Survey Employing ALMA (ODISEA) project. We identify a total of 26 narrow rings and gaps distributed in 8 sources and 3 discs with small dust cavities (r <10 au). We find that two discs around embedded protostars lack the clear gaps and rings that are ubiquitous in more evolved sources with Class II SEDs. Our sample includes five objects with previously known large dust cavities (r >20 au). We find that the 1.3 mm radial profiles of these objects are in good agreement with those produced by numerical simulations of dust evolution and planet–disc interactions, which predict the accumulation of mm-sized grains at the edges of planet-induced cavities. Our long-baseline observations resulted in the largest sample of discs observed at ∼3–5 au resolution in any given star-forming region (15 objects when combined with Ophiuchus objects in the DSHARP Large Program) and allow for a demographic study of the brightest $\sim\! 5{{\ \rm per\ cent}}$ of the discs in Ophiuchus (i.e. the most likely formation sites of giant planets in the cloud). We use this unique sample to propose an evolutionary sequence and discuss a scenario in which the substructures observed in massive protoplanetary discs are mainly the result of planet formation and dust evolution. If this scenario is correct, the detailed study of disc substructures might provide a window to investigate a population of planets that remains mostly undetectable by other techniques. 

ABSTRACT Dippers are a common class of young variable star exhibiting day-long dimmings with depths of up to several tens of per cent. A standard explanation is that dippers host nearly edge-on (id ≈ 70°) protoplanetary discs that allow close-in (<1 au) dust lifted slightly out of the mid-plane to partially occult the star. The identification of a face-on dipper disc and growing evidence of inner disc misalignments brings this scenario into question. Thus, we uniformly (re)derive the inclinations of 24 dipper discs resolved with (sub-)mm interferometry from ALMA. We find that dipper disc inclinations are consistent with an isotropic distribution over id ≈ 0−75°, above which the occurrence rate declines (likely an observational selection effect due to optically thick disc mid-planes blocking their host stars). These findings indicate that the dipper phenomenon is unrelated to the outer (>10 au) disc resolved by ALMA and that inner disc misalignments may be common during the protoplanetary phase. More than one mechanism may contribute to the dipper phenomenon, including accretion-driven warps and ‘broken’ discs caused by inclined (sub-)stellar or planetary companions. 

We present new 890 μ m continuum ALMA observations of five brown dwarfs (BDs) with infrared excess in Lupus I and III, which in combination with four previously observed BDs allowed us to study the millimeter properties of the full known BD disk population of one star-forming region. Emission is detected in five out of the nine BD disks. Dust disk mass, brightness profiles, and characteristic sizes of the BD population are inferred from continuum flux and modeling of the observations. Only one source is marginally resolved, allowing for the determination of its disk characteristic size. We conduct a demographic comparison between the properties of disks around BDs and stars in Lupus. Due to the small sample size, we cannot confirm or disprove a drop in the disk mass over stellar mass ratio for BDs, as suggested for Ophiuchus. Nevertheless, we find that all detected BD disks have an estimated dust mass between 0.2 and 3.2 M ⊙ ; these results suggest that the measured solid masses in BD disks cannot explain the observed exoplanet population, analogous to earlier findings on disks around more massive stars. Combined with the low estimated accretion rates, and assuming that the mm-continuum emission is a reliable proxy for the total disk mass, we derive ratios of Ṁ acc ∕ M disk that are significantly lower than in disks around more massive stars. If confirmed with more accurate measurements of disk gas masses, this result could imply a qualitatively different relationship between disk masses and inward gas transport in BD disks. 

While planets are commonly discovered around main-sequence stars, the processes leading to their formation are still far from being understood. Current planet population synthesis models, which aim to describe the planet formation process from the protoplanetary disk phase to the time exoplanets are observed, rely on prescriptions for the underlying properties of protoplanetary disks where planets form and evolve. The recent development in measuring disk masses and disk-star interaction properties, i.e., mass accretion rates, in large samples of young stellar objects demand a more careful comparison between the models and the data. We performed an initial critical assessment of the assumptions made by planet synthesis population models by looking at the relation between mass accretion rates and disk masses in the models and in the currently available data. We find that the currently used disk models predict mass accretion rate in line with what is measured, but with a much lower spread of values than observed. This difference is mainly because the models have a smaller spread of viscous timescales than what is needed to reproduce the observations. We also find an overabundance of weakly accreting disks in the models where giant planets have formed with respect to observations of typical disks. We suggest that either fewer giant planets have formed in reality or that the prescription for planet accretion predicts accretion on the planets that is too high. Finally, the comparison of the properties of transition disks with large cavities confirms that in many of these objects the observed accretion rates are higher than those predicted by the models. On the other hand, PDS70, a transition disk with two detected giant planets in the cavity, shows mass accretion rates well in line with model predictions.