Compression of Dust Aggregates via Sequential Collisions with High Mass Ratios

Abstract

The structure of dust aggregates affects many aspects of planet formation, such as the dust collision outcome, opacity, and radiation field. The millimeter-wave scattering polarization in protoplanerary disks indicates that dust aggregates have relatively compact structures with a volume-filling factor ≳0.1. In this study, to explain such compact dust aggregates, we examined the compression of dust aggregates in sticking collisions with high mass ratios by performing a large number of N -body simulations of sequential dust collisions for a wide parameter range. Previous N -body simulations reported inefficient compression in equal-mass collisions between large dust aggregates. In contrast, we found that collisions with high mass ratios can compress the dust aggregate much more effectively. We also developed a new compression model that explains our results for sequential collisions with high mass ratios. Finally, we applied the new compression model to dust aggregates in protoplanetary disks and found a possible pathway to create relatively compact dust aggregates that explain the observed millimeter-wave scattering polarization.

Keywords

• Circumstellar dust
• Planet formation
• Planetesimals
• Protoplanetary disks