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Session 49 - Young Stellar Objects.
Display session, Tuesday, January 14
Metropolitan Ballroom,
We explore the behavior of vortices in the circumstellar disks associated with young stellar objects. We derive and discuss various classes of analytic solutions for vortices in disks, and then examine their long term behavior with numerical simulations. For disks with no self-gravity, we find that vortical disturbances, charaterized by particular vortensity profiles, are able to survive for time scales that greatly exceed the dynamical response time of the disk. In other words, our results clearly demonstrate that long-lived vortices are possible in circumstellar disks. We then study the behavior of vortices within massive, self-gravitating, sub-keplerian disks. Under these conditions, we find that the prospect for vortex growth and survival is considerably enhanced. Finally, we discuss the possible effects of vortices on the evolution of circumstellar disks and on the process of giant planet formation.
