James Webb Space Telescope's ground-breaking study of a planet-forming disk hints at future exoplanet discoveries

"So far, Webb didn't manage to take a direct image of an exoplanet orbiting AU Mic, but past research(opens in new tab) uncovered "numerous fast moving clumps" in the debris disk that may have been produced by a yet unknown object, Lawson said in a news conference. While analysis of the disk is still ongoing, Lawson told reporters that the disk has a definitive blue color. This finding is consistent with previous studies and indicates that the disk is made of small dust grains, causing it to be brighter at shorter wavelengths."

AU Mic has been under study for some time now. Here are some past reports I read on the system.

Probing the innermost region of the AU~Microscopii debris disc, https://arxiv.org/abs/2207.04116

NFANT “HOT NEPTUNE” PROVIDES CLUES TO ITS BIRTH, https://skyandtelescope.org/astronomy-news/infant-hot-neptune-provides-clues-to-its-birth/

My observation. Some older reports indicate the dust mass in the debris disk around AU Mic star is about 10E-2 earth masses or 0.01 earth mass, very small here. The AU Microscopii Debris Disk: Multiwavelength Imaging and Modeling, https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2007ApJ...670..536F/abstract, November 2007. ArXiv, https://arxiv.org/pdf/0705.4196.pdf, 56 pages. "The masses in the inner and outer regions of the porous grain model are around 1.0 × 10^−2 M⊕ and 2.3 × 10^−4 M⊕, respectively."

Two exoplanets are reported at AU Mic. AU Mic b and c. Reported with nearly 12 and some 22 earth masses.



 
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"So far, Webb didn't manage to take a direct image of an exoplanet orbiting AU Mic, but past research(opens in new tab) uncovered "numerous fast moving clumps" in the debris disk that may have been produced by a yet unknown object, Lawson said in a news conference. While analysis of the disk is still ongoing, Lawson told reporters that the disk has a definitive blue color. This finding is consistent with previous studies and indicates that the disk is made of small dust grains, causing it to be brighter at shorter wavelengths."

AU Mic has been under study for some time now. Here are some past reports I read on the system.

Probing the innermost region of the AU~Microscopii debris disc, https://arxiv.org/abs/2207.04116

NFANT “HOT NEPTUNE” PROVIDES CLUES TO ITS BIRTH, https://skyandtelescope.org/astronomy-news/infant-hot-neptune-provides-clues-to-its-birth/

My observation. Some older reports indicate the dust mass in the debris disk around AU Mic star is about 10E-2 earth masses or 0.01 earth mass, very small here. The AU Microscopii Debris Disk: Multiwavelength Imaging and Modeling, https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2007ApJ...670..536F/abstract, November 2007. ArXiv, https://arxiv.org/pdf/0705.4196.pdf, 56 pages. "The masses in the inner and outer regions of the porous grain model are around 1.0 × 10^−2 M⊕ and 2.3 × 10^−4 M⊕, respectively."

Two exoplanets are reported at AU Mic. AU Mic b and c. Reported with nearly 12 and some 22 earth masses.




10E-2 = 10 x 10^-2 = 0.1.
 
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10E-2 = 10 x 10^-2 = 0.1.
Correct, I should write 1E-2 which is MS Excel notation :) It is still 0.01 earth mass or less as the report quote shows. "The masses in the inner and outer regions of the porous grain model are around 1.0 × 10^−2 M⊕ and 2.3 × 10^−4 M⊕, respectively."

The size of AU mic disc is a variable from what I read in various sources. https://webdisks.jpl.nasa.gov/index.php, it could be 291 au diameter. Applying the MMSN to a 0.5 solar mass star, ~ 1665 earth masses total dust and gas could originally be in the postulated protoplanetary disc with dust mass ~ 17 earth masses.

Reports like this demonstrate how difficult it can be to determine debris discs around *young*, terrestrial size exoplanets documented.

Takeout and Delivery: Erasing the Dusty Signature of Late-stage Terrestrial Planet Formation, https://arxiv.org/abs/2301.05719

Ref - Takeout and Delivery: Erasing the Dusty Signature of Late-stage Terrestrial Planet Formation, 13-Jan-2023, 20-page PDF, attached.
 
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