The potential of multi-wavelength polarization measurements to constrain the magnetic field in protoplanetary disks

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Sebastian Wolf
• Subject Area: Astrophysics and Astronomy
• Term: from 2017 to 2023
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 389368861

The goal of this project is to study the feasibility to constrain the strength and structure of the magnetic field in protoplanetary disks from multi-wavelength polarization observations. These constraints are urgently required to verify the theoretically predicted impact of magnetic fields on the process of planet formation.There is a threefold motivation for the proposed study:(A) Magnetic fields are predicted to play a keyrole in the evolution of circumstellar disks and the formation of planets therein. However, these predictions which have been primarily derived from numerous magneto-hydrodynamic simulations are yet observationally largely unconstrained.(B) Since recently, state-of-the-art polarimeters/observatories covering a broad wavelength range (near-infrared/submillimeter/millimeter) are available which allow highly sensitive, high-angular resolution polarimetric observations of protoplanetary disks.(C) Since there exist various mechanisms that can cause the observed polarization in circumstellar disks, it is necessary to carefully identify which combination of complementary polarimetric observations indeed allows one to derive unique constraints on the magnetic field.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants