Welcome!
These are the web pages of the SACCRED Research Group at Konkoly Observatory, Budapest, Hungary. The group is funded by Starting Grant of the European Research Council (ERC), and officially started in July 2017.
Aims
This research program targets important challenges in predicting realistic initial conditions for the planet formation process. We will perform a large systematic study of the accretion-driven eruptions of newborn stars, and evaluate their influence on the structure, composition, and chemistry of the terrestrial planet forming zone in the circumstellar disk. The research will focus on three main questions:
- How does the mass accretion proceed in realistic, structured, non-axisymmetric disks?
- What physical mechanisms explain the accretion-driven eruptions?
- What is the effect of the eruptions on the disk?
The new research group will study young eruptive stars, pre-main sequence objects prone to episodes of extremely powerful accretion-driven outbursts, and combine new observations, state-of-the-art numerical modelling, and information from the literature. With a novel concept, we will first model the timedependence of mass accretion in circumstellar disks, taking into account the latest observational results on inhomogeneous disk structure, and determine what fraction of young stellar objects is susceptible to high mass accretion peaks. Next, we will revise the paradigm of the eruptive phenomenon, compelled by recently discovered young eruptive stars whose outbursts are inconsistent with current outburst theories. Finally, we will determine the impact of accretion-driven eruptions on the disk, by considering the increased external irradiation, internal accretion heating, and stellar winds.
