This research is providing a detailed interpretative framework within which sophisticated protoplanetary debris/accretion disk models can be compared with the expanding database of high quality optical, infrared and submillimeter ground based observations, as well as with infrared observations from space. This is enabled by a combination of advanced adaptive mesh numerical tools for magnetohydrodynamics, analytic theory, and Monte Carlo radiative transfer models to produce synthetic scattered light images and spectral energy distributions. There are three separate, but interrelated, lines of inquiry concerning observational diagnostics for disk-planet interaction: 1) radial structure in the form of disk gaps cleared and maintained by proto-planets; 2) azimuthal structure in the form of disk spiral waves/warps excited via embedded planets or external flybys (binary companion, unbound star or brown-dwarf); and 3) vertical structure in the form of disk scale heights as a proxy for protostellar disk turbulence. The disk scale height study will characterize turbulence generated in disks which governs when and how planetesimals accumulate to form planets. Further they are providing observational diagnostics for planets which maintain disk edges, and disk structure truncated by or excited by bound perturbers and stellar flybys. The work provides model predictions for the evolution and shape of proto-planetary systems which then can be tested from the observations of individual objects and the statistics of disks in clusters.
Broader Impact: The proposers? efforts to create links between analytic theory, numerical simulations, and observations play directly into their outreach strategy which has both a local and national focus. Their previous outreach efforts have led to the creation of a Rochester-based education and intern program for local high school seniors. They are adding to that here by actively increasing the presence of inner city children in the sciences by involving them directly in their research program. The work is also creating striking visual images and movies that can be used to tell the story of planet formation in ways which can engage both students and non-scientists. They are developing simulation-based web outreach modules distributed on a national level by placing the modules on the websites of major science magazines.
